Eurovision Semi Final 2: Cheers and Tears

Greece; Malta; Belarus; Finland; Austria

If Eurovision semi-final one was somewhat bland and dreary, things changed last night as semi-final two brought us most everything that you would expect from the competition.

Cheers for Conchita Wurst who, predictably, stole the show. This was mostly due to her drama queen stance, rather than the drag queen one that we have all become accustomed to over the past couple of months. Singing in the middle of the pack of fifteen did not seem to faze her, giving what was the best vocal of the evening in her rendition of a mediocre Bond-style theme. The crowd lapped it all up and gave her a resounding cheer as she pouted her thanks to the mainly gay contingent in the crowd.

The drama was not over though. After a delayed announcement of the qualifiers for Saturday, the "random" reading of the countries was left to just one of the final six. Austria was one of them and, as I shouted Israel at the TV, Conchita was announced as the tenth qualifier. There was much Miss Piggy-style hand gesturing and hair flicking from the Austrian as the audience erupted in a wave of self-satisfied relief.

Well done, Conchita. But what of the rest? As I implied, tears for Israel. Mei Finegold put on a wonderful performance of her song, but it was obviously not quirky or showy enough for the voters. It was definitely one of the best songs on the night and outshone the likes of Greece, whose rap-influenced party song had been sung much, much better on previous occasions.

No real surprises as far as Georgia, Latvia and Macedonia were concerned. Georgia just baffled everyone and Latvia's act looked and sounded like a couple of reject aliens from the 1980s Dr. Who era. Macedonia's Tijana was more entertaining when she spoke to Scott Mills on Tuesday than she was on stage. Some tears for Ireland, though. Kasey Smith could not replicate with her frock what the Slavic girls did for Poland. A shame really because Ireland's song was better, even if the vocals were a tad weak and off key.

Unlike Slovenia's performance, which turned out to be one of the best of the evening. I may be a little bias here because Round and Round is a particular favourite of mine and I was willing it through to the final. Tinkara may be your perception of the evil queen in Snow White, but she knows how to handle a flute and a killer chorus. She's also bagged a peachy place in the Final (17th - see the Grand Final running order here), so that will do her chances no harm.

Most of the other qualifiers were as expected although Belarus and, to some extent, Switzerland were a surprise. Having some of your near neighbours in your half of the draw can help, as we know.

And so to the Final, where Malta, Belarus, Norway, Poland, Austria, Finland, Switzerland, Greece, Slovenia and Romania join the 10 qualifiers from Tuesday.

Who will win? One of these four: The Netherlands, Austria, The UK or Sweden.

Romania; Poland; Switzerland; Norway; Slovenia

Photos courtesy of Eurovision EBU