Montenegro 2025: Nina Zizic with 'Dobrodosli'
After a surprisingly good watch of a national final, surprising winner and further surprising turn of events we have our first song for Basel:
I don't keep track of such things, but feel confident in stating a November selection is a relative rarity. One might assume an early selection may be symbolic of an organised delegation but apparently not as Montesong, or more so the aftermath, descended into a bit of a farce - and one the wrong side of Christmas for me to engage too much with.
Nevertheless, Montenegro are back after a bit of a hiatus and have eventually landed upon one of the more competitive entries in the lineup and one, in my opinion, far more likely to qualify from the semi finals than the original 'Click Bait', which is surely the first priority.
'Dobrodosli' doesn't bring much new to the Balkan Ballad back catalogue, and nor is it exceptional. I'm asking this as a fan however when I ask how many entries each year genuinely are either or both of those?
There is in my opinion, always space for something of this style and by the law of averages there will be plenty worse to come this year than what is a solid 7/10 effort.
Whilst that's not generally the type of rating to get votes by the bucket load, there is space for this to chime with enough people to make it through with professionalism not entirely lost on televoters. It's a pretty similar picture on the likely staging front with a whole lot of innovation unlikely to be seen and instead getting the basics nailed in will be the main ask. Nina meanwhile is a strong and experienced vocalist and convincing in the role.
What will ultimately decide the qualification outcome here in my opinion will be the allocation draw and whether any rival entries emerge. Possibly one western leaning markets may overprice in some markets.
Anyway, welcome back Montenegro and best of luck this year and moving forward.
*I'm switching to a new, more comprehensive (but equally subjective) scoring system for this year. For ‘track record’ I’m taking into account both the country in question as well as ‘similar’ entries.
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Personal Rating: 14/20
Staging Potential: 8/20
Televote Potential: 4/20
Jury Potential: 11/20
Track Record: 5/20
Total: 42/100
Early Prediction: 9th- 12th in the semis, 15th-20th if in the final.