The theme of this year’s Eurovision Song Contest is “Dare to Dream.” But the dream is now over for the 15 nations eliminated from the competition. The remaining 26 entries will battle it out in this weekend’s finale.
After the second semifinal on Thursday in Tel Aviv, the countries selected to advance to Saturday’s finale were Switzerland, Denmark, Sweden, Malta, Russia, Albania, Norway, The Netherlands, North Macedonia and Azerbaijan.
The eight countries eliminated from the competition were Armenia, Ireland, Moldova, Latvia, Romania, Austria, Croatia and Lithuania.
With the results of the first semifinal on Tuesday, a total of 20 countries have now been selected by juries and television audiences to go on to compete in the finale. They are joined by the nations that are automatically eligible for the finale: the “Big Five” largest contributors to the European Broadcasting Union — Germany, France, Italy, Spain and the United Kingdom — and the host country, Israel. That leaves a total of 26 nations vying to be the 2019 winner.
Thursday’s selections were made with equal weight given to the points awarded by juries of music experts and voting in the participating countries.
Click on the picture gallery above for a look at the countries participating in this year’s Eurovision Song Contest finale.