Tonight, the second semi-final of the Eurovision Song Contest 2014 will be held. 15 countries will compete for the 10 available tickets for the grand final on Saturday! You can read up here how the first dress rehearsal of tonight’s show went.

Just like back on Tuesday for Semi 1 (when we at least got all our “sure qualifiers” right), we were again compiling our qualifiers, and calculated them to the esc-chat.com prediction:

Sure qualifiers: Israel, Norway, Finland, Greece, Romania
Likely qualifiers: Malta, Poland, Austria, Belarus, Switzerland
Borderline qualifiers: Slovenia

In this table, you can see detailed, who of our editors predicts which songs to qualify. Further down, each of us is explaining why we think a country will qualify.

Country	Martin	Felix	Shi	Danny	TEAM
1. Malta	Qualify		Qualify	Qualify	75%
2. Israel	Qualify	Qualify	Qualify	Qualify	100%
3. Norway	Qualify	Qualify	Qualify	Qualify	100%
4. Georgia		Qualify			25%
5. Poland		Qualify	Qualify	Qualify	75%
6. Austria	Qualify	Qualify		Qualify	75%
7. Lithuania	Qualify				25%
8. Finland	Qualify	Qualify	Qualify	Qualify	100%
9. Ireland			Qualify		25%
10. Belarus	Qualify	Qualify		Qualify	75%
11. Macedonia					0%
12. Switzerland	Qualify		Qualify	Qualify	75%
13. Greece	Qualify	Qualify	Qualify	Qualify	100%
14. Slovenia		Qualify	Qualify		50%
15. Romania	Qualify	Qualify	Qualify	Qualify	100%

Malta:

Shi: “Warm, feel-good song, well performed and can be appealing to both jury and televote.”

Martin: “A friendly opener and one that should gather useful points from every country.”

Danny: “Happy feel-good song which is performed well and sure to have both jury and tele vote support.”

Israel:

Shi: “A strong uptempo song with a catchy melody and strong vocals, again ticks boxes for both audience and juries.”

Felix: “A strong pop song that will probably please both, televoters and juries. Great performed, as well.”

Martin: “Probably too aggressive to do very well in the final, but this is professional enough to qualify with ease.”

Danny: “One of the most modern pop songs in this year’s contest is performed brilliantly and will stand out amongst this bunch of songs.”

Norway:

Shi: “As one of very few ballads in this semi and a solid song, should not have a problem to make it through to Saturday.”

Felix: “No matter what, ten entries have to qualify – and this should do so even just by Jury votes.”

Martin: “Reports of Carl’s underwhelming rehearsals shouldn’t be enough to stop this one from qualifying as the only real ballad in a field of uptempo and weird songs.”

Danny: “Haunting ballad with an interesting performer which I think will get a lot of jury votes. ”

Georgia:

Felix: “Taking a risk here, but I think it will be rewarded for its artful composition and interpretation. It also should get some additional points from the televoters, as this does stand out and isn’t performed badly, either.”

Poland:

Shi: “While I am certain this will do extremely well with the televote, the jury is another question. But I think they have a few other options to ignore more and therefore place Poland high enough to make it through.”

Felix: “I am not sure here, but it could put off a lot of female jury members and televoters, while I guess there aren’t too many straight televoters to help this into the final. But I guess it will sneak in somehow.”

Danny: “Fun pop song that could get a lot of votes from viewers at home who think this is the essence of Eurovision.”

Austria:

Felix: “Conchita Wurst’s appearance divides the audience – even within our team, but beyond, there’s a strong song, an impressive staging and the televoting support of many fans.”

Martin: “An old-fashioned song and Conchita’s shouty performance probably won’t prevent Austria from making a splash on Saturday night.”

Danny: “One of the most memorable performers in this year’s contest with a classic song. I think people will see past the beard.”

Lithuania:

Martin: “Moldova’s typically strong semi-final voting base failed to materialise on Tuesday night, but I think fellow regular qualifiers Lithuania will be fine.”

Finland:

Shi: “It has been proven over and over again that there’s always room in the final for a well performed rock entry. It’s not the best song ever, but it is nice and melodic, and there’s no competition at all in the rock department.”

Felix: “The song stands out as its style quite unique in this line-up, and it’s a decent example even.”

Martin: “Not the most engaging performers, but Softengine are alone in their musical field tonight and the song is stadium-friendly and strong”

Danny: “Different from the other songs on the line up, this will get the votes from the people who like “real” music.”

Ireland:

Shi: “Gets to be last mostly because that’s the one I have the least idea about. While I feel the rehearsals weren’t convincing, I feel it has enough mainstream appeal in its friendly melody with the bit of Celtic feel to it, and she is also absolutely beautiful.”

Belarus:

Felix: “It’s an earworm, and apparently performed rather well. Borderline for me, the late draw should help the Cheesecake to be served in the final!”

Martin: “Surprisingly contemporary and with an engaging performance, this should get Belarus its second-best ESC result in the final (though that’s not saying much).”

Danny: “Catchy and well performed and will get support from both jury and televoters enough to just sneak through.”

Switzerland:

Shi: “One of the most charismatic performers this year, he owns the stage with this infectious tune, and the visuals for this look like they will work very well”

Martin: “A reluctant pick – I still worry that the song is short on actual hooks. Still, it ought to come as a breath of fresh air by this point in the show.”

Danny: “Jolly performance which I think will make a lot of people smile, and get votes from both jury and tele voters.”

Greece:

Shi: “Noisy, but looks great, has good energy and will get the audience going and with it the viewers at home. I am not sure the juries will buy it but i am sure they will not bury it either.”

Felix: “Probably the winner of this semi-final, but it does have its weak points, above all a mediocre song which I can’t see in the Top Five on Saturday.”

Martin: “My tip to win the semi-final. More televoter- than jury-friendly, but even the professionals should smile on this three minutes of silly fun.”

Danny: “Another modern pop song with a gimmick that tele voters will love. Juries, not so much but I think it’s a definite qualifier”

Slovenia:

Shi: “While not a very strong song, it is one of the few ballads in this semi and even fewer ethnic sounding songs, and it has a great draw almost at the end of the night and surrounded by uptempos.”

Felix: “It might as well not qualify, but the late draw, the ethnic elements and the jury-friendly performance should help.”

Romania:

Shi: “With the perfect draw as the closing number of the semi, they throw every kitchen sink in existence at us, but some will stick.”

Felix: “The staging doesn’t do this (already mediocre) song any favour, but the excellent draw and the sheer likability of Paula & Ovi will push this into a top 3 position tonight.”

Martin: “High on visual gimmicks and low on actual melody, but a great spot in the running order and Paula and Ovi’s dynamics will see this through.”

Danny: “Plum draw and good voices will see them through but I don’t think it’s going to be a “Playing With Fire.”

And now we wish you a great show! The second semi-final of the Eurovision Song Contest 2014 begins at 21:00 CET. Join our chat and be part of the fun!