Australia well positioned for Eurovision victory By Michael Idato Australia's Eurovision Song Contest entrant Dami Im celebrates making the final.
The Eurovision Song Contest's Australian entrant Dami Im will go into the final with a clear shot at winning, with two strong contenders representing Russia and Ukraine poised to split the eastern bloc vote. 
The three countries are firming up as the competition's favourites, a twist that takes on a potentially nail- biting context when you consider many European countries allocate their scores along political lines.
Should both Russia and Ukraine soak up neighbouring points equally, rather than one of the two countries take the lion's share, it could open the field to the next tier of competitors - in which Australia is now prominently positioned.
Im, a 27-year-old former winner of the reality TV show The X Factor, has been the darling of the competition since touching down in Stockholm last week.
Like last year, Australia is again being treated as a much-loved newcomer by most of the competition's established players.
"I would really love it if I could win, I would do it for Australia," Im told Fairfax Media after coming off stage from an intense performance in the second semi-final. "[But] that's not up to me."
Eurovision does not release scores for its semi-final rounds, but to make the cut Im would have needed to win a large slice of audience votes from the other competing countries, as well as a high score from each country's professional jury; the two scores are then combined.
Im conceded, smiling, that it could have been "really embarrassing" if she had not made the cut.
"The pressure was, what if I don't make it into the final, that would be really embarrassing," she said.
"Now that's off my chest I can just have fun."
Australia and 19 other second semi-finalists - Latvia, Georgia, Bulgaria, Ukraine, Serbia, Poland, Israel, Lithuania, Belgium, Hungary, Croatia, the Netherlands, Armenia, Russia, Czech Republic, Austria, Azerbaijan, Cyprus and Malta - now go to this weekend's final.
Those 20 countries join the so- called "big five" - Italy, Britain, Germany, France and Spain - and the host country, in this case Sweden.
The winner of the competition - now in its 61st year - is determined using an antiquated scoring system in which each country allocates one to eight, 10 and 12 points to other countries.
SBS will air the semi-finals on Saturday and the final of the 61st annual Eurovision Song Contest live on Sunday.