Eurovision 2019: UK's last-placed entry has score lowered

The UK's last-placed Eurovision Song Contest entry has had its score lowered by five points, organisers say.

A revision of scores means Michael Rice's song Bigger Than Us picked up only 11 points from Saturday's final.

The contest said an incorrect calculation had been used to create a "substitute" set of points after the Belarusian jury was dismissed.

The contest top four is unchanged - and Duncan Laurence from the Netherlands stays the winner with his song Arcade.

Rice originally secured 16 points at the event in Tel Aviv, Israel - including three from the public vote - ending up in 26th place.

After the revision of scores, the 13 points he was awarded by the juries from the other participating countries dropped to eight points.

The Belarusian jury had been dismissed after their votes from the first semi-final were revealed, against the contest rules.

The European Broadcasting Union said it then created a "substitute aggregated result" based on the results of other countries with similar voting records to determine the Belarusian jury scores for the final.

However, "due to a human error an incorrect aggregated result was used".

It added: "The EBU and its partners... deeply regret that this error was not identified earlier and will review the processes and controls in place to prevent this from happening again."

Rice told the BBC's Victoria Derbyshire programme he was "really proud of [his] performance".

"I enjoyed the whole experience, I was living the dream and I wouldn't change a thing," he added.

"It's just made me stronger. It built my confidence up - I'm back in the studio making my album, so there are things that came from this experience regardless of the result."

Asked if he thought it was time for Eurovision's use of judging panels to end, he said it was not his decision to make.

But he added that the UK team "walked away with our head held high".

"It was an honour to represent the country."

Under the corrected vote, the winning song from the Netherlands secured an additional six points - finishing up on 498 points.

Italy, Russia and Switzerland made up the top four, all gaining extra points.

Norway was among the other countries to have been deducted points, and fell from fifth to sixth place.

Despite the UK result, Rice said he had enjoyed taking part, adding: "I'm so thankful to the fans... as well as my whole team who have supported me throughout this whole amazing journey."

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