Kristian Kostov is the clear favorite to win the second semi final tonight. The Bulgarian teenager is currently in third place to win the entire contest with the bookmakers behind Italy and Portugal. However, qualification will not be the only thing on his mind during tonight’s show.
Running order
Both Kristian’s opponents, Italy and Portugal, have drawn a spot in the first half of the running order. This means that if Bulgaria manages to draw a spot in the second half of the show, it might be a huge benefit for him. However there are only three or four spots in the second half left for the 10 qualifiers of tonight’s show. Therefore chances are below 50% that Bulgaria actually takes this spot.
Staging
Sacha Jean-Baptiste did the staging for Bulgaria’s entry this year. The performance has grown on many people in the press center, improving every single runthrough. Sacha herself told ESC Daily that she considers it a huge honour to work with Kristian Kostov:
Ballads
There is one other issue that could influence Bulgaria’s chances in the Grand Final: the amount of ballads taking part. As ESC Daily’s chief editor Steef van Gorkum found out in his research, ballads can only win the competition when there are less than 40% ballads in the Grand Final.
There is a good chance of this happening this year. So far, we have 5 ballads in the Grand Final and if less than 5 ballads qualify tonight, the percentage is safely below 40%. Therefore, Kristian Kostov will not only hope to qualify himself, but also that Denmark, Netherlands, Croatia, Malta and Ireland do not all go through as well.