Latvia 2020 • Samanta Tīna - "Still Breathing"

I feel weird not loving her in a forum everyone loves her. First, I do think is good, it's an enormous change for Latvia it's original and will stand out from the rest positively or negatively but it's not my favorite I don't love it, I think it lacks a structure, I mean more than half of the song is Samanta "screaming-singing" and going nuts like she just had a sugar-overdose and the rest is her saying things like "I AM A COMPOSAH" It feels messy and crazy, now  I support craziness but this confuses me but I also think that's her goal. She gives Conan Osiris vibes, most of the fans love her, some just don't understand her, she is a fan favorite but at Eurovision she's gonna be misunderstood by the juries and non-escfans, just like Conan (Btw Still hurts)

12 points!!!
It's about time sent her, and with an avant garde song too!!!

If we're referring to this bettings odds page (https://eurovisionworld.com/odds/eurovision), there's some context here.

The web page is titled "Who will win Eurovision Song Contest 2020?" From a non-better's perspective, I assume people are betting on who they think will win this year's contest. As of this post, Iceland, Lithuania, and Russia are coming out the highest. This probably means more people believe that these countries have the highest chance of winning and are betting higher amounts for them.

As we go down the list, the rankings are skewed as the percentages become more evened out. A significantly lesser amount of people are betting on these countries because they would believe that they have no shot at placing first at all. The percentages between these lower-listed countries are much closer together. Latvia, though it gets good reviews, has not been touted as a possible winner according to these odds. And so are other countries falling in the 1-2% range.

Basically, the main list we're looking at is based on who could be the winner, not necessarily Top 10, Top 20, Top 26, etc. So with the odds right now, Latvia can still qualify in Rotterdam, but it does not mean, they are a contender to win or even place high.

This is exactly why you don't need to pay attention to the odds at this moment.  

Countries like Sweden for instance (or basically those with a National Final that hasn't taken place yet) are high in the odds because of the songs they have in their selections. For instance, if Dotter, who is the fan favorite to win MF, makes it to Rotterdam, due to Sweden's very successful results lately, the country will probably rise a lot in the odds to win. Therefore they are that high. Same with Romania that was even first for a while before their final took place and when they didn't choose 'Cherry red' that seemed to be a fan favorite, or maybe for other reasons (maybe the live performances of Roxen were not as convincing), they dropped because people just stopped betting on them and kept on betting for other countries like Lithuania, Iceland etc. 

Malta and Bulgaria are there because people have expectations and go for 'blind betting' sometimes, although for the case of Malta, Destiny is well-known and people know that with a very good song, since she's loved by many fans, she could easily bring a good result for her country, so there is also some explanation behind that. The odds for like Switzerland and Bulgaria show them to be high because the former did very well last year with a similar kind of 'internal selection' so people have expectations and the latter because Bulgaria has been sending songs that appeal quite a lot to fans since their comeback in 2016. Why is San Marino low for instance, despite the fact we know nothing about their entry? Simply because it's a country that usually struggles and reaching the final is literally like a victory for them... lol

In any case, it is all done for the money and is also based on previous results of the countries, expectations as of what they could choose etc. At this point and even after all songs have been revealed, the odds will anyway be quite misleading... The only time that you can take them more 'seriously' is basically once rehearsals begin and we have a more 'equal view' of every single entry. Also don't be surprised if countries that go to Eurovision in Concert or London Eurovision Party rise in the odds after their performances there, that is also something that usually happens. Fuego was hardly qualifying to the final based on the odds before the rehearsals, also because Eleni didn't attend any pre-parties, then rose up to the top after her rehearsals. So as I said, don't take them seriously, it isn't even worth it at this point.