Croatia participated in the Eurovision Song Contest 2017, which took place in Kyiv, Ukraine, in May 2017. After the successful return in 2016, Croatian national broadcaster Croatian Radiotelevision (HRT) confirmed on 17 September 2016 that they would also participate in 2017.[1]
Prior to the 2017 contest, Croatia had participated in the Eurovision Song Contest twenty-two times since their debut in Millstreet1993.[2] The nation's highest placing in the contest was fourth, which they achieved two times: in 1996 with the song "Sveta ljubav" performed by Maja Blagdan and in 1999 with "Marija Magdalena" performed by Doris Dragović. Following the introduction of semi-finals for the 2004 contest, Croatia had featured in six finals. Croatia's least successful result in the final has been twenty-third place, which they achieved in 2016 with the song "Lighthouse" performed by Nina Kraljić, their first final performance after 7 years. And Croatia's least successful result in semi final has been sixteenth place, which they achieved in 2007 with the song "Vjerujem u ljubav", performed by Dragonfly and Dado Topić.
Before Eurovision[]
Internal selection[]
On 17 February 2017, the Croatian national broadcaster HRT announced that it had internally selected Jacques Houdek to represent Croatia at the Eurovision Song Contest 2017.[3] The song that Houdek performed at the Eurovision Song Contest, "My Friend", was presented on 2 March 2017 during the radio programme Svijet diskografije broadcast on HR 2 and hosted by Zlatko Turkalj Turki.[4] The song was written by Houdek, Tony Roberth Malm, Siniša Reljić, Arjana Kunštek, Ines Prajo and Fabrizio Laucella.[5] Kunštek and Prajo were also the co-writers of "Ne brini", the Bosnian Eurovision Song Contest entry in 2003. In regards to her song, Houdek stated: "This is the song of my life and certainly the best thing I wrote so far. I’m happy that I have gathered such a great team of authors who have helped me to make the idea of the song come true and we believe that it will represent our homeland in the most beautiful light".[6]
At Eurovision[]
According to Eurovision rules, all nations with the exceptions of the host country and the "Big Five" (France, Germany, Italy, Spain and the United Kingdom) are required to qualify from one of two semi-finals in order to compete for the final; the top ten countries from each semi-final progress to the final. The European Broadcasting Union (EBU) split up the competing countries into six different pots based on voting patterns from previous contests, with countries with favourable voting histories put into the same pot.[7] On 31 January 2017, a special allocation draw was held which placed each country into one of the two semi-finals, as well as which half of the show they would perform in. Croatia was placed into the second semi-final, to be held on 11 May 2017, and was scheduled to perform in the second half of the show.[8] After the official semi final draw was released, Croatia was supposed to perform 12th. After Russia's withdrawal, Croatia was set to perform 11th. Jacques Houdek managed to qualify to the grand final placing 8th in the semi with 141 points.[9] This was second year in a row that Croatia qualified. In the final, he performed 13th and finished on the 13th place with 128 points, which was Croatia's best result in 10 years.[10]