At 12:00 CET today the host city for the Eurovision Song Contest 2017 in Ukraine will be revealed, will it be Kyiv or Odessa?
After nearly three months of an extensive bidding process to host the 62nd edition of the Eurovision Song Contest, the host city will be known today. A total of six cities across Ukraine were involved in the bidding process which has seen huge public conversation in Ukraine as well as significant interest from across Europe.
The six cities that bid to host next years contest were as follows:
- Dnipro
- Kharkiv
- Kherson
- Kyiv
- Lviv
- Odessa
Kharkiv, Kherson and Lviv were all knocked out of the bidding process at the end of July. Kherson had been a significant underdog from the start of the bidding process, while the biggest shock was the knocking out of Lviv. The city had been deemed one of the front-runners to host, however key details about their bid to host was lacking.
In July the European Broadcasting Union visited the three host cities who made it through to the final round; Dnipro, Kyiv and Odessa. All three were deemed to be suitable to host the contest, however since then there has been a number of delays to ensure the host city selected is suitable. Dnipro is still formally in the running to host this years contest, however the contest is truly between Kyiv and Odessa.
The past week has seen a war of wordsย being thrownย between Odessa and Kyiv, the two front-runners to host next years contest. Media in Odessa had reported that the contest would be awarded to their city on Monday, however these reports were false. While Kyiv has been vocal about its ability to host the contest to a higher standard than Odessa.
The threeย cities and their planned venues are as follows:
- Dnipro โ DniproEuroArena โ 9,500 capacity
- Kyiv โ International Exhibition Center โ 10,000-13,000 capacity
- Odessa โ Choronomorets Stadium โ 10,000-12,000 capacity
You can watch the host city announcement live with English commentary from 12:00 CET here.
#Kiev2017
odessa
O-DES-SA! O-DES-SA! ๐ #Odessa2017