Why ‘nul points’ is better than not taking part

Doing badly at Eurovision is better for national morale than not taking part in the competition, a study has found.

Researchers from Imperial College London found that finishing near the bottom of the table was associated with a 13 per cent higher chance of life satisfaction, compared with not taking part. Meanwhile, people were four per cent more likely to be satisfied with their life for every increase of 10 places on the final scoreboard.

Data was collected around the time of the contest between 2009-2015. The research is published in the journal BMC Public Health.

It came as Russia last night failed to qualify for the Eurovision final for the first time.