Ireland's gone Turkey??

I thought I have seen it all! clearly thats not true. One week after the deadline for submitting potential Eurovision songs to RTÉ, rumours are rife of an unusual entry.

All Kinds of Everything, ESC Today and even RTE itself, are reporting that Dustin the Turkey is one of the contenders for Eurosong 2008, with his song '12 Points' ('Douze Points'), which may in itself be a tongue-in-cheek parody of all things Eurovision. If the rumour is true, which I hope its not, and he is selected for the Irish final, it will mean that the remaining five Eurosong finalists have to face one of the country's biggest and best-known stars in the race for Belgrade.

Dustin shot to fame when he was introduced in RTÉ's highly successful show The Den in 1990. He was introduced as a character as a prize for a golf tournament winner - however, it turned out that he was not only still alive, but also had a North Dublin accent! Since then, Dustin has outlived four human co-presenters making him the longest serving member of the cast of The Den.



Noting by the reactions in the forum, if he wins Eurosong 2008, he will without a doubt be one of the favorites to win the contest in May.

The reliable website, All Kinds of Everything, reports the date, 23rd February and the venue, University Concert Hall, Limerick, have now been confirmed.

It is also known that the presenter of the show will be Ray D'Arcy, who was the presenter of "You're A Star", the same show that selected the Eurovision entries for Ireland in 2003 (Mickey Harte), 2004 (Chris Doran) and 2005 (Donna and Joe).

Due to a very disappointing last place in 2007, Ireland will have to participate in the first semifinal of this year's Eurovision in Belgrade, to be held on the 20th May.