Polina Powers ESC 2015 Profits

May 27, 2015 by Rob

‘Just when I thought I was out… they pull me back in’. And so it goes with Eurovision. After a few days recovering from an intense 2 weeks in Vienna you find yourself delving into the split results to figure out what exactly went on.

As always there are plenty of surprises. Italy winning the televote by such a margin and yet ending up third after being snubbed by juries isn’t a situation many foresaw.

Sweden topping the jury vote by such a huge margin, almost as dominant as Loreen in 2012, is similarly startling. My thinking this year was, the one thing that might prevent a Sweden win was jurors being punitive in their assessment of ‘Heroes’.

UK jurors ranked Sweden only 6th in semi-final 2. While Malta and Ireland fell by the wayside, that same UK jury ended up ranking Sweden first in the final. A small trend is that juries tend to favour those songs they have previously assessed in the semi-final.

Estonia doing so badly with juries is probably the biggest mystery of the year. ‘Goodbye To Yesterday’ looked a banker top 5 on the jury side of things and yet it landed a miserly 53pts, a lowly 12th among juries. It was the sort of song that looked more likely to end up struggling on the televote from trap 4 and yet it did remarkably well with the folks at home with only 4 nations proving more popular.

Looking at Estonia’s performance in semi-final 1, that juries awarded more points to the likes of Netherlands while Estonia languished in joint 8th with Belarus beggars belief. But it was good to at least see the likes of Latvia, Belgium and Norway rightly acknowledged by juries as outstanding songs, and also to see Israel deservedly finish in the top 10.

The 2 banker semi-final non-qualifiers advised – FYR Macedonia and Iceland – were both well and truly sunk, and as seemed most likely to happen Finland received a massive thumbs-down among juries. Poland suffered at the hands of jurors too but managed 8th place overall in semi-final 2 after, as expected, landing a sizeable televote.

Azerbaijan wasn’t far off a shock semi-final 2 elimination, taking 10th place only 10pts clear of Malta. It would appear a new paradigm is required for a nation that used to consistently vie for top 3 in semis and top 5 in the final.

Serbia’s top 10 finish in the grand final and landing the Top Balkan spoils was a small and somewhat unlucky dent in this year’s profits. It was the right play to take it on at the odds especially after Bojana put in a very poor live effort in front of the juries on the Friday night, and it suffered a massive jury drop as predicted, joint 23rd with the UK.

53pts is usually a total that would see a country down in 15th or lower. That Serbia somehow scrambled 10th is partly an anomaly brought about by the exceptional strength at the top of the leaderboard, and the dramatic fall away after Israel in 9th.

FYR Macedonia and Montenegro both had their jury voting disqualified which resulted in Serbia landing 22 of its points from its televote-only Balkan friends. Whether it might have dropped at least 2pts with a jury vote factored in is a moot point but you would have strongly fancied Albania to top the jury rankings in Montenegro as it did in semi-final 1 in 2014 which would have very likely seen it leapfrog Serbia in the scoring there.

Top Balkan may well be one to duck in future after going big on Greece in 2014 only to see it lose out to Romania. Romania was the value pick this year but under-performed somewhat, juries not rating it as highly as anticipated.

As far as this site goes, 2015 proved a vintage year in terms of betting analysis and predictions. Russia was the last ESC recommendation given to readers for free, flagged up back on March 17 as the outstanding value wager e/w ante-post at 33-1 and Polina performed tremendously, pushing Mans all the way for the win. Russia became the first 300+ point scorer in a grand final not to win.

Nine out of 10 qualifiers were called correctly in both semi-finals and the two biggest qualification lays, Iceland and FYR Macedonia, both landed.

This year, for the first time, an email subscription betting service was offered to readers for the price of £40. It proved a resounding success. A +90 point profit figure was achieved, which surpasses last year’s +84pt return, and represented a ROI of over 36%, extending EntertainmentOdds outstanding record for profitable tv betting analysis since it was founded in August 2009.

Below is the full list of recommendations given to subscribers. Together with the last free recommendation given on Russia, the total ESC 2015 profit comes in at +104.5pts.

Looking ahead to ESC 2016 this site will be dedicated to unearthing the value wagers exclusively for subscribers. Be sure to subscribe next year as the aim will be to turn a substantial profit once more.

Enjoy a relaxing summer. The site will be back in the autumn for the traditional run of Strictly and X Factor.

ESC 2015 betting recommendations:

Free:

Outright: Russia – 2pts e/w, 33-1 (quarter the odds, first 4), Coral = +14.5pts

Subscribed:

Pre-rehearsal value picks –

Semi 1 – Romania – 1pt e/w 50-1 – bet365 (40-1 with SportingBet at time of email notification) = -2pts

Georgia – 0.5pt e/w 33-1, William Hill, bet365 = -1pt

Semi 2 – Cyprus – 0.5pts e/w, first 3 places, 33-1 – SportingBet = -1pt

Day 1:

Netherlands – not to qualify – 1.5 – bet365 – 20pt win = +10pts

Greece – to qualify – 1.4 – Bwin – 20pt win = +8pts

Day 2:

Romania – Outright – 0.5pts e/w – 150-1 – Coral (e/w first 4) = -1pt

Romania – to finish top 10 – 5-1 – Paddy Power – 2pt win = -2pts

FYR Macedonia – not to qualify – 5pt win – 11-10 – bet365 = +5.5pts

Russia – to win semi 1 – 9-4 Stan James – 4pt win = +9pts

Day 4:

Iceland not to qualify from semi 2 – 11-4 – 32Red, Unibet, 888sport, 51-20 with Bwin – 4pt win = +11pts

Cyprus to qualify – 1-2 – bet365, 32Red (& partners) & bwin – 20pt win = +10pts

Day 5:

Armenia to qualify – 2-5 Betfred (4-11 with bet365) – 20pt win = +8pts

Macedonia – not to qualify – 11-10 Boyles (Evens with 32Red, Unibet etc) – 5pt win = +5.5pts

Day 6:

Poland to qualify semi 2 – 8-13 William Hill – 13pt win = +8pts

Cyprus to qualify from semi 2 – 4-9 with SportingBet. Also available at 2-5 with Bwin & 32Red & its partner sites (Unibet, 888sport) – 20pt win = +8pts

Day 7:

Cyprus semi 2 – 1pt e/w – 20-1 (first 3 places) – Ladbrokes = -2pts

Cyprus – top 3 finish semi 2 – 9-4 – Betfred – 4pt win = -4pts

Day 8:

Greece – semi 1 – 33-1 – Coral, bet365, Boylesports – 0.5pt e/w = -1pt

Poland – top 3 finish – semi 2 – 20-1 – Betfred – 0.5pt win = -0.5pt

Greece – to finish top 10 in final – 11-4 – Paddy Power – 4pt win = -4pts

Day 9:

FYR Macedonia – not to qualify – 4-6 Betfair Sportsbook (3-5 Boylesports) – 12pt win = +8pts

Estonia – semi 1 – top 3 – 8-13 – Betfred – 13pt win = +8pts

Romania – semi 1 – top 3 – 11-4 – Betfred – 2pt win = -2pts

Russia – top 4 finish in the final – 10-11 – Betfred – 11pt win = +10pts

Day 10:

Top Balkan – Romania – 8-1 – bet365 – 1.5pt win = -1.5pts

Greece – 6-1 – BetVictor, Paddy Power – 1.5pt won = -1.5pts

Slovenia – 3-1 – bet365, BetVictor, Paddy Power – 1pt win = -1pt

Belgium – Top 10 finish – 4-7 – widely available – 7pt win = +4pts

Day 11:

Poland – not to qualify – 13-8 – 8pt win (to close position at zero profit) – SkyBet, Betfair Sportsbook = -8pts

Cyprus – not to qualify – 3-1 – 5pt win – Boylesports (to reduce potential profit if it qualifies, or potential loss if it is a shock NQ) = -5pts

Norway – top 3 finish – 8-11 – 32Red – 5.5pt win = -5.5pts

Iceland – not to qualify – 2-1 – Betfair Sportsbook – 4pt win = +8pts

Czech Republic to qualify – 15-8 – Coral – 2pt win = -2pts = -2pts

Day 12:

Belgium – 14-1 – e/w a quarter the odds first 4 places – bet365, Paddy Power, William Hill – 2pts e/w = +5pts

Belgium – 6-4 – top 5 finish – Paddy Power – 4pt win = +6pts

Latvia – top 10 finish – 5-6 – Paddy Power – 6pt win = +5pts

Latvia – top 5 finish – 4-1 – Paddy Power, 32Red – 1pt win = -1pt

Latvia – 40-1 – e/w a quarter, first 4 – bet365, Paddy Power – 0.5pt e/w = -1pt

UK finishing position – 21st-27th – Evens – Coral & Betfred – 5pt win = +5pts

Day 13:

Romania – top 10 – 11-4 – Paddy Power, Boylesports – 2pt win = -2pts

Romania – Top Balkan – 11-2 – Paddy Power – 2pt win = -2pts

Who will UK give 12pts to? Australia – 11-2 – Ladbrokes – 1pt win = -1pt

Subscription bets:

Profit = +90pts – a 249pt investment returning 339pts; an ROI of over 36%

(+14.5pts)

Total ESC 2015 profit = +104.5pts