The UK has suffered further embarrassment following its last-place finish in the Eurovision Song Contest 2019 after a huge voting error saw Michael Rice’s score DROP five points.
Rice represented Britain in the annual music extravaganza on Saturday, performing the track ‘Bigger Than Us’.
He finished in 26th place, supposedly with 16 points – 13 from the jury vote, 3 from the public.
While the 21-year-old avoided the dreaded ‘nul points’, it was the fourth time the UK came bottom of the leaderboard.
But today there is further bad news, as Eurovision officials have owned up to a significant blunder with the results.
It came after chiefs dismissed the Belarusian jury for publicly revealing how it voted in last Tuesday’s semi-final.
This breached Eurovision rules, which stipulate that semi-final results cannot be revealed until the grand final has concluded.
Instead, the European Broadcasting Union announced that an “aggregated result approved by the auditors” would replace the missing jury.
However, after the contest had finished, vigilant Twitter user @euro_bruno noticed irregularities in the Belarusian jury points.
Media and Eurovision fansites picked up on the analysis, and now the EBU has reissued the results of the grand final, admitting the aggregated data originally used was not accurate.
The EBU’s statement
“The EBU can confirm, following standard review practices, we have discovered that due to a human error an incorrect aggregated result was used,” the organisation said.
“This had no impact on the calculation of points derived from televoting. The overall winner and Top 4 songs of the Contest remain unchanged.
“To respect both the artists and EBU Members which took part, we wish to correct the final results in accordance with the rules.
“The EBU and its partners digame and Ernst & Young deeply regret that this error was not identified earlier and will review the processes and controls in place to prevent this from happening again.”
Therefore, the UK has lost the 5 points it supposedly received from Belarus during Saturday’s broadcast.
Rice remains in last place, but his score now stands at 11 points – 8 from juries, 3 from the public.
Meanwhile, the correction has also seen Norway lose its top 5 placing, falling to 6th in a swap with Sweden.
Norway won the public vote during the final, with KEiiNO’s song ‘Spirit In The Sky’ proving most popular with viewers.
Duncan Laurence’s ‘Arcade’ remains the overall winner of Eurovision 2019, meaning the Netherlands will still host next year’s contest.
The corrected results are available in full on the official Eurovision website.
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