The second semi-final of the Eurovision Song Contest 2019 is just a few hours away, and so it’s time for us in the escgo! team to predict the ten qualifiers for the grand final on Saturday!

Two days ago, Martin got 8/10 right while Shi and Felix each managed 7/10. And let’s be honest, we were all caught off guard by Serhat. But where will we be right and wrong tonight?

You can see the choices of Shi, Martin and Felix in the table below – followed by a brief summary of their views!

Country	Martin	Felix	Shi	TEAM
1. Armenia	Q		Q	66.7 %
2. Ireland				0 %
3. Moldova		Q		33.3 %
4. Switzerland	Q		Q	66.7 %
5. Latvia		Q		33.3 %
6. Romania				0 %
7. Denmark	Q		Q	66.7 %
8. Sweden	Q	Q	Q	100 %
9. Austria		Q	Q	66.7 %
10. Croatia	Q	Q		66.7 %
11. Malta	Q		Q	66.7 %
12. Lithuania				0 %
13. Russia	Q	Q	Q	100 %
14. Albania				0 %
15. Norway	Q	Q		66.7 %
16. Netherlands	Q	Q	Q	100 %
17. North Macedonia		Q	Q	66.7 %
18. Azerbaijan	Q	Q	Q	100 %

Shi:
Much like semi 1 last year, I have more songs I would have wanted to see in the final than spots. While I feel fairly confident about most of my choices, I was still down to three choices for the last qualifier. Norway feels like it won’t do well with juries and the televise has enough to rank above it, Romania is, well, Romania. They can miss out as we know, but they need to try very hard to not be in contention, and Armenia, which is like Romania plus a possible strong jury appeal. I went with the jury getting this one in. Also: my main prediction for tonight is 10 points separating 6 and 14.

Martin:
The way Kate Miller-Heidke changed up her vocals in the last part of the song to make it more interesting; the creepy floating dead dad heads behind Joci Pápai that made the whole thing a bit “eww”; ZENA having an amazing personality on stage; Tulia not having any personality at all. What do these things have in common? I didn’t anticipate any of them because (I guess) I wasn’t paying enough attention in the run-up to semi 1. Still, rather than learn from this insight, I’m going to stick with my prejudices when it comes to semi 2. So I expect North Macedonia to fuck things up like they always do, and Croatia to milk the cheese vote like nobody’s business. Go on – prove me wrong.

Felix:
I made one daring decision, and that is leaving Switzerland out of my qualifiers, and having Latvia instead. Why would I have a strong song as NQ and a weak one as Q, you might wonder? Easy, I think that presentation and effective use of the stage is playing a big role, and Switzerland sadly does a whole lot of counterproductive things with the staging. Latvia sells their song much better. Well, for the Swiss and many German Luca Hänni fans, I certainly hope I’m wrong, as I’d love to see the guy in the final. The rest is obvious I think.

Will we be right or completely wrong? There’s only a few hours left until we find out – so whatever you’re doing and whomever you’re watching the show with, enjoy the evening and may the best songs qualify!