Eurovision shouldn’t have been in the UK

Surely he meant that it shouldn't have had to be held in the UK.

Or have I missed something?

From Metro:

He said while he has ‘lots of respect’ for the UK and it is an ‘amazing country’, he wishes that a country that shares a border with Ukraine, such as Poland or Slovakia, could have been chosen.

While speaking at the headquarters in capital Kyiv, Zelensky said that from the start, he held the opinion that if Ukraine could not host, it should have been a neighbouring country ‘where our people could travel to easily and be very close.’

That’s fair enough, surely? It’s in the UK because our entry was second.

It's a bit late now isn't it.

Tbf to Zelensky, he has a good point and he and the winning band should have been consulted on where it should be held.
Poland a good choice maybe.

Whether they should or should not have been consulted, it's too late to say this now isn't it and rather unfortunate for Liverpool in particular, who has gone to so much trouble to host the event, with Ukraine as last years winners front and centre.

Such gratitude for all the support!

Does leave rather a bad taste doesn't it GSM.

Smileless2012

Does leave rather a bad taste doesn't it GSM.

Well no, it doesn’t, because all he was saying was that it would have been good for Ukrainian morale if more of their citizens could have attended. We’d feel exactly the same if we were the ones at at war and the competition was in Ukraine rather than in say, Ireland or France. It’s not a slight on the UK in any way.

He doesn’t complain when we give him money though does he. Perhaps Liverpool would rather have saved the expense of this. Some gratitude from him, for once, wouldn’t go amiss.

Yes - and just today it was confirmed that we are giving them missiles that cost £2m each, I thought it was a gesture of goodwill when, having come second last year because of the obvious sympathy vote for Ukraine, we said we would host the contest this year on their behalf. I don’t have the slightest interest in it these days, but that comment is disappointing and far from gracious.

Forsythia

He doesn’t complain when we give him money though does he. Perhaps Liverpool would rather have saved the expense of this. Some gratitude from him, for once, wouldn’t go amiss.

For goodness sake you can’t mean that.

Well it does for me Casdon. If he felt the contest would have been better held in a country bordering Ukraine, he could and should have said so at the time.

For goodness sake I do, it’s costing us a fortune. Money which could be spent on the NHS!

Perhaps those Countries should have offered to host and put forward a planned bid, unfortunately they didn’t.

Here’s what happened.
www.euronews.com/culture/2022/07/27/how-have-ukrainians-responded-to-eurovision-being-hosted-in-the-uk

I am not interested in gratitude, I am interested in us doing what is right.

Liverpool will have made a fortune from hosting.

My son and DIL have tickets and they cost them hundreds, plus the hotels will all be full, and people are likely to stay for the weekend and spend more money. It wasn't an act of charity.

Yes that's true too. I work for one of the local authorities that failed to be host city. They certainly didnt put all that effort in to secure the bid in the name of charity.

No of course it wasn't an act of charity Doodledog and it goes without saying that the event will bring a lot of revenue for Liverpool, but it looks from the link Casdon's provided that if the UK hadn't offered to host, there may well not have been one this year at all.

I was responding to the post saying that it was costing us a fortune that could have been spent on the NHS. Nonsense.

Here is the explanation. If President Zelensky doesn't like it he ought to take it up with the EBU.
"Normally, the winning country hosts the following year's competition, but the ongoing war in Ukraine makes this impossible. The European Broadcasting Union (EBU), which organises the contest, invited the UK to host on Ukraine's behalf as UK contestant Sam Ryder was the runner up in the 2022 show."

I think he should have made his wishes clear when they won no point wingeing now is there We came second and they couldn’t so all ,are sense at the time
I don’t watch it anyway so not sure why I m answering 😂

People seem to have decided that Zelensky is complaining that the competition is being held in the U.K. He isn't. He's merely saying that he would have preferred it to have been in a neighbouring European country, so that many more Ukrainians could have attended. He has also made a point of emphasizing that he’s just grateful that it's still going ahead, and has added that he has “lots of respect” for Britain, which he describes as an “amazing country”. Typically, the media have chosen to focus on the first part of the message in isolation, in order to play up the controversy that they're always looking for. I'd probably feel the same in Zelensky's position, although I think I'd have perhaps tried for better timing.

He said, she said and somewhere in the mayhem is the truth.