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Azerbaijan wins Eurovision 2011

Azerbaijan has won the 2011 Eurovision Song Contest after a spectacular show in Düsseldorf with their song, "Running Scared."

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Azerbaijan has won Eurovision Song Contest for 2011.

Ell & Nikki pulled 221 points with their duet, “Running Scared.”

It was a battle for second place which fell to returning nation Italy on 189 points.

Third was Sweden on 185 points.

Coming in last place was Switzerland on 19 points.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iq2yLykdjvA[/youtube]

But the song by Azerbaijan, which ranked third with the bookies, must go down as one of the most uninspiring wins in recent times. Musically, there were much stronger entries. “Running Scared” sat in a bunch of safe, inoffensive songs -but clearly millions of Europeans didn’t see it that way…

Staged at Esprit Arena, Düsseldorf turned on a spectacular show. It was a night of boybands, divas, fire, smoke, a unicycle, sand, magic, muscles and just a dash of the 1960s.

The night even included a shout-out to Australia; “G’day mate.”

The favourite for the night, France’s Amaury Vassili was well back in the scoring, whilst defending champion Lena from Germany was unable to match her 2010 success.

1.Azerbaijan 221
2.Italy 189
3.Sweden 185
4.Ukraine 159
5.Denmark 134
6.Bosnia & Herzegovina 125
7.Greece 120
8.Ireland 119
9.Georgia 110
10.Germany 107
11.United Kingdom 100
12.Moldova 97
13.Slovenia 96
14.Serbia 85
15.France 82
16.Russia 77
17.Romania 77
18.Austria 64
19.Lithuania 63
20.Iceland 61
21.Finland 57
22.Hungary 53
23.Spain 50
24.Estonia 44
25. Switzerland 19

30 Responses

  3. Pretty bland winner but the whole field was a bit weak this year, so there weren’t many songs that would have been widely considered worthy of the prize. Really well produced show though! Even the crosses to the country spokespeople were less shambolic than normal.

    Julia and Sam weren’t too bad this year either. As always they seemed to hit top form later in the show, which I suspect might have something to do with a few glasses of champagne going down. Particularly liked their discussion of Blue – “The audience just adores them.” “Not as much as they adore themselves.”

  4. I always look at it this way: Azerbaijan only got 12 points from 3 countires – out of 43! 13 countries didn’t even have them in their top 10.

  6. Also, agree about Greece. Last year’s song was one of the best (Opa!) but this year’s wasn’t very good at all. I guess, unlike last year, the rest of Europe isn’t p**sed off with Greece about bailing out their economy!

    And Germany did a bang up job hosting. That time lapse footage of the football stadium being reconfigured for Eurovision was pretty amazing.

  8. It was a good night

    I find it interesting that Azerbaijan got 3rd last (23rd) on SBS’s Official Unofficial Scorecard. Amazing the different tastes between Australia and Europe.

    I liked Ireland and Denmark, Anyone notice if you closed your eyes during Ukraine it sounded like Delta Goodrem?

    matt

  9. Azerbaijan have done well every year since 2008 when they entered. Just didn’t think they’d win this soon!! haha
    Serbia deserved more points, my personal favourite. Plenty of countries deserved less points – I mean come on – 12 points to Spain??
    Anyways, Azerbaijan is just such a fun name to say/hear that I’m glad that eurovision will be there in 2012!!

  10. We thought it a very bland year for entries – no stand out songs at all – And the rubbish that they feel they have to pronounce about the sanctity of the voting. BS! This is still bloc voting as can be plainly seen. The preponderance of these seceded independent countries is also a joke. Too many votes for too few a people. Having said that. Still enjoy it. and will continue to watch

  12. Faves in our household were Serbia (so cute), Ireland (bonkers), Hungary (diva techno) and Georgia (the only group who went hard). Moldova, who we liked ;ast year as well, got bonus points for their excellent hats and the unicycle fairy (!!) and the story behind Iceland’s song was quite touching. Lena’s song was darker and less catchy but we liked it overall, she went a bit Bjork this year. However, Azerbaijan were bland. Their win was quite disappointing. Ah well, bring on 2012!

  13. I really liked Moldova, they were so much fun – as were their proto-Devo hats – so now I’m glad I didn’t manage to catch the finals . I must say I’m glad that Jedward didn’t win – I thought there was something creepy about them.)The semifinals were really well done, so if the final was anything like that then it should have been great, and I did love Julia Zemiro’s commentary, she’s a hoot.

  14. Such a terrible top three, you crazy Europeans. When Azerbaijan came on I thought they were just making up countries to make the show even longer….

    Serbia was robbed. I wonder if they would have done better if they’d done the english version?

    youtube.com/watch?v=dQtyCNa00tc

  16. @deedee
    U.K placed a more respectable 11th this year.

    I must say I never expected Azerbaijan to win, it wasn’t a terribly memorable song . I also have no clue why Greece was so high.

  17. And agree too with Todd’s comments. The Germans (like their recent predecessors) staged an excellent show. The Postcards were fantastic. Not so much a fan of the interval act but last year’s interval act was going to be hard to beat. But full credit to the Germans.

  19. Yes Australia did get a welcome at the start of the show, but what SBS edited out was that co-host Anke (trivia: she is the German voice of Marge Simpson) remarked that Australians were watching the show at 5.00am Australian time… well, some of us were 🙂

    Overall, good coverage by SBS over the three nights. I love Julia Zemiro because she has such enthusiasm for the event and you can tell she genuinely loves being there. And she is funny. Her backstage interviews were all good even if some of the acts were less interested in talking (e.g. Italy).

    And fewer commercial breaks by SBS compared to past years. That is a plus.

    And if you closed your eyes, the Irish song wasn’t really that bad (really…!). You just had to block out the image of the twins dressed like Lady Gaga. But they didn’t score well in the end anyway. And I thought Sweden might have edged into the lead. And I’m sorry Serbia didn’t fare better it was a very infectious tune and apparently there is an English language version in YouTube.

    Italy coming 2nd was a shock. And I think Switzerland didn’t deserve to come last. But for an all-so-brief moment during the voting, the UK was at the top of the ladder. How long since that has happened…??!?

    Not thrilled at the song that won. Not really memorable or catchy at all. But despite all efforts bloc voting never really does go away, does it. But despite its faults we still love Eurovision.

    Now I suppose we can all go back to watching MasterChef…!

  24. Well done Azerbaijan & congrats to Dusseldorf for putting on one of the highest quality Eurovision shows in many years. I was rooting for Ireland but totally understand why they didn’t win this year. The calibre of song has grown exponentially over the past decade. Now to go Google the capital of Azerbaijan!

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