Sweden Wins Eurovision Song Contest

Sweden has won the 57th Eurovision Song Contest with singer Loreen scoring 372 points for her dance track Euphoria.

Sweden was one of the early favourites to win this year’s contest along with Italy. The competition was held in Baku; the capital of Azerbaijan. The host country’s own song When Music Dies by Sabina Babayeva performed well with voters in Europe scoring 150 points and coming 4th.

It was a disappointing night once more for the UK with Engelbert Humperdinck coming 25th out of 26 countries with a lowly 12 points. However, the UK performed first in the competition which obviously had a big affect on how the voting went. Norway came last in the competition while Denmark didn’t perform brilliantly despite having a very good song. Italy, the other early favourites, ended in 9th place with 101 points.

X Factor duo Edward and John Grimes, aka Jedward, returned to Eurovision to represent Ireland once more. Their energetic performance of Waterline won them 46 points finishing 19th – worst than last year’s entry by the twins. This year’s final saw 26 countries take part – the biggest final since 2003; while 42 countries participated in the voting.

The Eurovision Song Contest has an estimated audience of 125 million viewers across Europe and the competition is also televised in Australia, New Zealand and parts of the United States.

The top five in last night’s competition were; Sweden with Euphoria scoring 372 points, Russia with Party for Everyone scoring 259 points, Serbia with Nije Ljubav Stvar scoring 215,  Azerbaijan with When Music Dies  scoring 150 points and in fifth place Albania, which performed surprisingly well, with Personal scoring 146 points.

With Sweden winning the competition next year’s Eurovision Song Contest will return to Stockholm which previously hosted the contest in 2000.