Czech Republic: Benny Cristo's Eurovision 2021 entry to be selected internally

Czech Republic: Benny Cristo's Eurovision 2021 entry to be selected internally
Monday, 04 January 2021

  • CT, the Czech national broadcaster, has confirmed that the song for the country's Eurovision 2021 hopeful, Benny Cristo, will be selected internally. 

    In the recent years Czech Republic has been selecting their ESC entries through a combination of online public voting and jury votingAfter last year's national selection that saw Benny Cristo selected as the act to defend the Czech colors at Eurovision 2020, the national broadcaster is opting this year for a internal song selection.

     

    Last year the contest was cancelled due to the covid-19 pandemic and Benny Cristo never got the chance to perform on the ESC stage in Rotterdam. After this unprecedented development, CT, decided to invite back Benny and give him the chance to complete his Eurovision journey this year in Rotterdam. The song, however, will be selected internally and not through a national selection format like last year. 

    Besides the announcement on the song selection , CT , appointed a new Head of Delegation. Namely,  Mr Krystof Samal, who has contributed in the Czech delegation many years as the Head of Press will be leading the Czech Delegation at the upcoming Eurovision Song Contest in The Netherlands next May.

     

    Czech Republic in Eurovision

    Czech Republic appeared for the first time in the Contest in 2007 with  Kabat. A a row of disappointing results the country withdrew in 2010 and didn’t return until 2016. In 2016 its return was followed by a grand final qualification for the first time . The best result came for the country in 2018 with  Mikolas Josef who achieved a top 10 placing by finishing  6th , in  Lisbon with his entry Lie to me.

    In 2019, Lake Malawi represented the country and finished 11th in the final . This was the country’s third qualification to the final . The outstanding element was the gap between the jury voting that placed the group 8th with 150 points while the public vote placed the Czech at the 24th place.

    Last year Benny Cristo was selected to represent the country with his song "Kemama" but as this year's contest was cancelled due to the coronavirus pandemic his Eurovision 2020 journey remained incomplete.