Why did the “Eurovision Curse” claim Mae Muller?

Mae Muller was the beacon of hope this year to continue the legacy of Sam Ryder who finished second in last year’s Eurovision Song Contest… However, Muller came second to last. What happened?

Sam Ryder’s tenure as the UK representative for Eurovision was euphoric. It was the best result the UK had in 24 years and gave everyone in the country that cheesy, glitter-infested spark that was once lost due to constant low placements in recent years.

For the first time in forever, Britons across the country thought: ‘Oh we could actually win for once!’

When Mae Muller took the reins in March, she made sure she came prepared with a sassy and energetic feel-good anthem. Everyone was excited to see Muller perform on home turf and win another good result for the UK. Even most musicians had Muller’s back on the night; from Bucks Fizz to Ringo Starr and even Prime Minster Rishi Sunak created his own Eurovision playlist on Spotify to get into the spirit. It was speculated for a long time by bookmakers that she would finish in a top 10 placement at least. The excitement for the Eurovision Grand Final was immense.

She was the last to perform, closing the show. The audience roared in affection. It all seemed like she was going to continue in Sam Ryder’s footsteps.

Then came the voting sequence…

UK audiences were gasping in horror and disappointment when Mae Muller’s track, ‘I Wrote a Song’ scored only 24 points overall, finishing in the second-to-bottom placement. She was only awarded nine points from the televoters.

Many fans felt sorry for the up-and-coming 25-year-old. Countless people said she ‘deserved better’ along with speculations as to why she didn’t get the scores people expected her to receive.

One reason that critics suggested was that Muller simply delivered a poor performance; as rumours circulated during rehearsals, stating that her vocals were flat and that the choreography was weak.

However, this year’s Australian representatives Voyager are convinced there is another reason to Muller’s poor result. A curse.

‘Maybe it’s the curse of the UK, maybe Sam Ryder broke that curse last year so I don’t know – maybe someone forgot to put the bay leaves in the patchouli this year. I really don’t know.’

Despite being just a big, bright, and beautiful song festival where viewers can vote for their favorite tunes, the fans can be quite superstitious.

According to the Eurovision Wiki, there are several Eurovision curses all relating to how some acts perform in the competition.

Such as the ‘Green Curse’, which involves acts who wear green or uses the colour green in their staging are less likely to be successful on the night or even qualify in the grand final. Or the ‘Curse of Number Two’ which is the phenomenon that nobody who goes second in the running order has ever won Eurovision in its 67-year run referred to as ‘The Death Slot’.

Not forgetting to mention ‘The Winner’s Curse’ that every Eurovision winner who reenters the contest ends up not winning and unable to defend their title. The curse was broken this year with Loreen’s win, making her join the ranks of Eurovision legend, Johnny Logan.

Many people speculate that the UK has its own Eurovision Curse; where UK acts are not allowed to surpass the bottom-two placement, or at least get on the left-hand side of the leaderboard. Only 4 acts in the last 20 years managed to do so: Jade Ewen in 2009, Blue in 2011, Lucie Jones in 2017, and of course, Sam Ryder last year.

So let’s investigate this, shall we? Is it all a superstition? Or are we Brits just bad at this competition?

Looking at the graph above, in the last 20 years, the UK has come last in the Grand Final 5 times, 2 of those times receiving nul points in 2003 and 2021. We just can’t forget about Jemini, can we…

And, the UK has only received one podium place with Sam Ryder last year. Doing some quick maths, which is based on a normalised average and readjusted to cater to this year’s competition (excluding 2020’s competition).

Drumroll, please...

The average placement for a UK entrant for Eurovision based on songs submitted in the last 20 years is 20th out of an average of 25 countries. Which, I will be honest is not good.

For more research, I also snooped around in the r/AskUK Reddit forum to see why Britons themselves think we underperform at Eurovision.

Many people thought that we sent too many gimmicky acts and didn’t take the competition seriously enough.

“Think the problem is most of Europe take this contest very seriously and really want to win, while most people in the UK consider it a joke and something to laugh at.”

Some people brought it down to political voting…

“With Brexit and general political voting, the UK are very unpopular in Europe.”

And some people proposed the idea that, frankly, we’re just crap.

“Our entries are always forgettable. It's not that they are especially terrible, the vast majority of the time, it's just that you have forgotten the song by the time the next performer finishes. It's always a bland song that you'd find at the tail end of a Now That's What I Call Music CD for filler purposes.”

In terms of Muller’s entry, unfortunately, there were a few things, mentioned above, that caused the unfortunate low score. This year saw variety, one act after another gave something completely different and out worldly, such as Finland’s entry, Norway’s entry, and Belgium’s entry. No two acts were the same. Muller’s song was very middle of the road and got lost in the running order, even if she performed last with bright pyrotechnics and all.

Yes, the UK has done quite badly in recent years, but it isn’t because of a ‘curse’. The UK has so much potential in the competition but always goes too safe with the song selection. Hopefully, next year’s entrant in Sweden can get a better result.