In May the Netherlands ended a 44 year wait for their fifth Eurovision win — despite failing to win either the jury vote or televote (a similar result we saw with Ukraine’s Jamala in 2016). But what happens if we take this year’s Eurovision result and apply the pre-2004 system, whereby only countries competing in the grand final vote? Would Duncan Laurence hang on to his Eurovision trophy? And how would this shake up the rest of the results?

In the three tables that follow, you can see what would have had happened if the pre-2004 system had been applied in Tel Aviv. These results are based on the actual points awarded by the 26 grand finalists, and differences from their actual voting results are indicated in brackets. As at Eurovision 2019, the tie-breaker rule is applied to all countries with the same total number of points — aka, the country with more televotes wins the tie.

Eurovision 2019: Alternative final results

In this first table, the results are based on the combined scores between the 26 grand finalists — after the corrected results from the EBU — and the top 5 have all swapped places. As a result, Mahmood would’ve dethroned Duncan Laurence as the new winner of Eurovision 2019 for Italy. Switzerland move up to third just ahead of Sweden under the tie-breaker rule, with Russia down to fifth.

Greece’s Katerine Duska would gain the most from the old system — moving up six places to 15th, just ahead of the Czech Republic under the tie-breaker rule. It also means Lake Malawi are the biggest loser of the old system, who fall 5 places from 11th to 16th.

Italy – 313 points (Up 1 place) The Netherlands – 295 points (Down 1 place) Switzerland – 236 points (Up 1 place) Sweden – 236 points (Up 1 place) Russia – 226 points (Down 2 places) Norway – 218 points (No change) Azerbaijan – 192 points (Up 1 place) North Macedonia – 189 points (Down 1 place) Australia – 176 points (No change) Iceland – 129 points (No change) Denmark – 86 points (Up 1 place) Cyprus – 84 points (Up 1 place) Malta – 84 points (Up 1 place) Albania – 72 points (Up 3 places) Greece – 71 points (Up 6 places) Czech Republic – 71 points (Down 5 places) France – 60 points (Down 1 place) Slovenia – 52 points (Down 3 places) Estonia – 47 points (Up 1 place) San Marino – 43 points (Down 1 place) Serbia – 37 points (Down 3 places) Spain – 36 points (No change) Belarus – 22 points (Up 1 place) Israel – 21 points (Down 1 place) Germany – 17 points (No change) United Kingdom – 3 points (No change)

Eurovision 2019: Alternative televoting results

Of course, only televoting existed back in 2003. Here we focus on the televote and exclude the results from all 15 eliminated semi-finalists. Norway continued to top the table ahead of second placed Italy by 38 points, an increase from the 30-point margin KEiiNO had in the grand final televote this year.

San Marino would’ve dropped out of the top 10 and fallen 5 places to 15th, with Denmark taking its place having gained 5 places. Without the 3 points from Ireland, the United Kingdom also ended up with the dreaded nul points alongside Germany.

Norway – 197 points (No change) Italy – 159 points (Up 1 place) The Netherlands – 153 points (Down 1 place) Switzerland – 140 points (Up 1 place) Russia – 136 points (Down 1 place) Iceland – 102 points (No change) Australia – 88 points (No change) Sweden – 71 points (Up 1 place) Azerbaijan – 60 points (Down 1 place) Denmark – 50 points (Up 5 places) North Macedonia – 43 points (Up 1 place) Albania – 39 points (Up 5 places) Spain – 35 points (Up 1 place) Slovenia – 33 points (Down 3 places) San Marino – 31 points (Down 5 places) Serbia – 30 points (Down 3 places) Estonia – 25 points (Down 1 place) Greece – 24 points (Up 3 places) Israel – 21 points (No change) Cyprus – 20 points (No change) France – 20 points (Down 3 places) Malta – 14 points (No change) Belarus – 13 points (No change) Czech Republic – 4 points (No change) Germany – 0 points (Up 1 place) United Kingdom – 0 points (Down 1 place)

Eurovision 2019: Alternative jury results

The juries weren’t brought back until 2009, so here are this year’s jury results based on the 26 grand finalists only. Although North Macedonia was eventually confirmed as the jury winner from the EBU, Sweden would’ve won the jury vote under the 2003 system — and all the countries that finished within the top 10 except Azerbaijan have swapped places as a result.

Sweden – 165 points (Up 1 place) Italy – 154 points (Up 2 places) North Macedonia – 146 points (Down 2 places) The Netherlands – 142 points (Down 1 place) Azerbaijan – 132 points (No change) Switzerland – 96 points (Up 1 place) Russia – 90 points (Up 2 places) Australia – 88 points (Down 2 places) Malta – 70 points (Up 1 place) Czech Republic – 67 points (Down 2 places) Cyprus – 64 points (No change) Greece – 47 points (Up 2 places) France – 40 points (No change) Denmark – 36 points (Down 2 places) Albania – 33 points (Up 2 places) Iceland – 27 points (Down 1 place) Estonia – 22 points (Up 3 places) Norway – 21 points (No change) Slovenia – 19 points (Down 3 places) Germany – 17 points (Up 1 place) San Marino – 12 points (Up 2 places) Belarus – 9 points (No change) Serbia – 7 points (Down 4 places) United Kingdom – 3 points (No change) Spain – 1 point (No change) Israel – 0 points (No change)

Photo: Thomas Hanses