Eurovision jam

A recent European championship produced a shock result, causing continent-wide catastrophising, soul-searching and rancour to dwarf that of most trade deals or football clashes.

- JANE CLIFTON

Despite the fact that to win the annual competition marks one out as irredeemably naff, the Eurovision Song Contest is still passionately contested. It's divisive to the point of striking a more resonant challenge to European unity than Brexit. Yet it's the perfect projection of the European Union, because, as with the EU, every Eurovision decision seems to embarrass and annoy winning and losing nations alike, binding them ever more closely together.

With the event's TV ratings being about as vertiginous as the complaints count, most countries enthusiastically embrace its peculiarities. It's daft but it's fun.