Second, eh? Is there a more annoying position? Well, maybe not if you’re the host broadcaster. But if you’ve travelled half-way across Europe with high hopes, then finishing second and finishing sixteenth are about the same thing.
In 1995 when the contest was always in Ireland, suitors came and went and the win usually went to the home country. However, in 1995, RTÉ let someone else win. Norway in fact, with its Irish melody. However, in second we had a proper song from today’s birthday girl Ana Isabel Conde Sánchez who did her stuff with a song that might – just might in any other decade – have won. But whilst the world loved everything with an Irish connection, second was it. Still, second wasn’t so bad. Spain hasn’t had it so good since, and Anabel turned up in Kyiv backing the Andorran entrant Marian van de Wal in 2005. And was more popular than Marian too.
Anabel is 47 today.
Feliz cumpleaños, Anabel!