We only know Bulgaria's song so far but statistically and history wise this is considered the strong SF of the year.
Checking the countries' record in the 50/50 era (2016-2021), this SF has 12/18 countries with a positive Qualifying record.
It also contains 6/10 SF winners of the same era and the most impressive fact is that Ukraine that has the best average ranking has not won a SF even though it won the trophy back in 2016!
Now to the less fortunate. Five countries have a negative qualifying record. Three of them will perform in the first half (Latvia, Switzerland, Slovenia) and three in the second (Croatia, Iceland). Taking in consideration the momentum, Latvia and Slovenia are the ones to be in trouble and they will need to put some extra effort to qualify.
I will post some voting patterns later in the season but for the moment I will just post some rankings with the qualification records, current streaks and the Ranking averages (Total-Juries-Televoting) just to have an idea
Current Qualification Streak
1. Ukraine 12 Qs
2. Netherlands 4 Qs
3. Bulgaria 4 Qs
4. Norway 4 Qs
5. Albania 3 Qs
6. Switzerland 2 Qs
7. Russia 2 Qs
8. Iceland 2 Qs
9. Greece 2 Qs
10. Moldova 1 Q
11. Lithuania 1 Q
12. Portugal 1 Q
13. Slovenia 1 NQ
14. Denmark 1 NQ
15. Armenia 2 NQ
16. Austria 2 NQ
17. Croatia 3 NQ
18. Latvia 4 NQ
Qualification Record in 50/50 era (2016-2021)
1. Bulgaria - Netherlands 4/4
3. Ukraine 3/3
4. Norway 4/5
5. Russia 3/4
6. Portugal 2/3
7. Albania - Moldova - Lithuania - Denmark - Austria - Greece 3/5
13. Armenia 2/4
14. Switzerland - Slovenia - Croatia - Iceland 2/5
18. Latvia 1/5
Taking in consideration the momentum that Switzerland and Iceland are building in the last two contests and he fact that 12 more countries have a positive record (it could have been 13 if Croatia didn't miss the Final last year even though it finished in Top-10 both with Juries and Televoting), this is the toughest SF ever, at least in paper.
Average Total Ranking in 50/50 era (2016-2021)
1. Ukraine 3
2. Bulgaria 4
3. Netherlands 4.3
4. Russia 6.3
5. Portugal 6.7
6. Norway 7.2
7. Moldova 8.2
8. Lithuania 9
9. Austria 9.4
10. Switzerland 9.6
11. Armenia 10
12. Greece 10.2
13. Denmark 10.6
14. Iceland 10.6
15. Albania 11.4
16. Slovenia 11.6
17. Croatia 12
18. Latvia 14
Average Jury Ranking in 50/50 era (2016-2021)
1. Bulgaria 3.3
2. Netherlands 3.5
3. Ukraine 5
4. Russia 7
5. Portugal 7.3
6. Norway 8.2
7. Switzerland 8.4
8. Austria 8.8
9. Moldova 9.2
10. Armenia 9.5
11. Greece 9.6
12. Albania 11
13. Slovenia 11
14. Croatia 11.2
15. Lithuania 11.4
16. Iceland 11.6
17. Denmark 11.6
18. Latvia 12.2
Average Televoting Ranking in 50/50 era (2016-2021)
1. Ukraine 2.3
2. Bulgaria 5
3. Russia 5
4. Portugal 6
5. Norway 6.6
6. Netherlands 7
7. Moldova 7.2
8. Lithuania 8.2
9. Switzerland 9.6
10. Iceland 9.8
11. Greece 9.8
12. Armenia 10
13. Denmark 10.2
14. Croatia 10.4
15. Albania 10.6
16. Austria 10.8
17. Slovenia 12.2
18. Latvia 14.2
This is theoretically a televoting oriented SF and it will be very interesting to see which countries will rise to the occasion and which ones will flop.
