Eurovision 2009: Norway was the winner with the jury!

The results of the jury vote from all the 42 countries taking part in the 2009 Eurovision Song Contest are known.

These are the results from the 210 European music professionals:

1. Norway (312 points)
2. Iceland (260 points)
3. United Kingdom (223 points)
4. France (164 points)
5. Estonia (124 points)
6. Denmark (120 points)
7. Turkey (114 points)
8. Azerbaijan (112 points)
9. Israel (107 points)
10. Greece (93 points)
11. Moldova (93 points)
12. Bosnia & Herzegovina (90 points)
13. Malta (87 points)
14. Germany (73 points)
15. Armenia (71 points)
16. Ukraine (68 points)
17. Russia (67 points)
18. Portugal (64 points)
19. Croatia (58 points)
20. Lithuania (31 points)
21. Romania (31 points)
22. Sweden (27 points)
23. Albania (26 points)
24. Finland (12 points)
25. Spain (9 points)

Notice how Azerbaijan and Turkey are a bit down the order compared to their result of 3rd and 4th in the final results.

If the results were based on the juries alone, we can see how several countries would have done much better. This is the case of United Kingdom, France, Estonia, Malta or Germany, to name a few.

It has to be admitted that the 50/50 voting is a huge success and it was seen that bloc voting is reduced but not disappeared just yet. Lets take for example Ireland. In recent years Ireland has voted for countries where a large diaspora live in Ireland, such as Latvia, Lithuania and Poland. In 2008 Ireland gave 8 points to the UK, 10 to Poland and 12 to Latvia. This year however, Ireland gave 8 to Norway, 10 to the United Kingdom and 12 points to Iceland. It is to be noted though that Latvia and Poland were not in the final, but Lithuania were, and got 7 points from Ireland. Its a sign of the advantage of the jury, but perhaps, its due to the economic downturn in Ireland, where unfortunately, many of our European friends have gone home.

But there are still issues, Azerbaijan gave 12 to Turkey while Turkey paid them back with a 12. Cyprus gave 12 to Greece. Germany is still giving high points to Turkey due to many Turks living in the country.

The Executive Supervisor of the EBU, Svante Stockselius, made a statement regarding the new voting system and its final outcome: "We believe it was the right time to introduce this new voting system, and it is fantastic to see that both televoters as well as professional juries massively backed the same contestant. Some finished higher because of support from the juries, others finished higher because of support from the televoters across Europe. It also made the presentation of the points less predictable, despite the overwhelming support for Alexander Rybak's entry."

The final scoreboard is available here.
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