We may not be winners but we'll always have Wogan. Hurrah for Eurovision, says Beth Squires

Once a year the British public gets to decide on a musical representation of this country; a band or singer who can show the rest of Europe exactly what we’re made of. Last year it was Daz Sampson, a 32-year-old ‘rapper’ who took to the stage resplendent in stonewashed denim, his hair gleaming with wet-look gel. This year the UK voted for the cartoonish pop group Scooch, whose act consists of two men and two women cavorting around in flight attendant costumes, singing suggestive lyrics to a sub-par-Steps backing track.

Somehow, I don’t think we were taking the entire thing completely seriously again, but you can see where us Brits are coming from with this choice. Opening this year’s show in Helsinki were last years Finnish winners, the faintly terrifying Lordi, with Hard Rock Hallelujah. Lordi had more sophisticated costumes and props perhaps, but Scooch tried their hardest to measure up with their jaunty hats and in-flight refreshment trolleys during Flying The Flag.

As is always the case, the acts were an enjoyable mix of dire, hilarious, confusing and earnest. Earnest won the title this year as Serbia’s Marija Serifovic and her song Molitva took home the most points and the honour of her country hosting 2008’s show. Amusingly described by someone I was watching with as ‘a cross between Jimmy Krankie and Kd Lang’, a suited Serifovic belted out her traditional Eurovision ballad with female backing singers, hairsprayed to within an inch of their lives, clutching at each other slowly and, apparently, meaningfully. Heaven knows what was going on, but the final hand clutch (with half of a heart drawn on each hand and then held up to the camera) hinted that the song was about love.

The best of the rest included Spain, who entered a slightly rubbish boyband dressed all in white with perfect hair, and Belarusian Koldun; a man who thinks he looks like Princess Diana (but was more like a young version of magician Gob from Arrested Development) enhanced by his thick make-up and black-clad levitating dancers. France commissioned Jean Paul Gaultier to create their band’s hot-pink and black costumes, which made their performance a Eurotrash-esque feast for the eyes; highlights included the stuffed cat on the bald singer’s shoulder and the fabulous white feathered wings on the drummer. A mad operatic singer from Slovenia had fibre-optic lights attached to her hand, Greece entered a Londoner who wanted to be Ricky Martin, Georgia enlisted backing sword-fighters, Moldova went with a singer whose trousers were so dangerously low that the audience knew exactly what kind of bikini wax she favoured, and Ireland’s lead singer just looked startled and afraid throughout her performance. Sweden were superb, entering a glam-rock band in silver and black, whose fabulously dressed lead singer had an impeccable and impressive knowledge of exactly which camera was going to be on him next and where it would be. Last of the noteworthy acts was Ukraine, who enlisted a Christopher Biggins-alike to dress up as a flamboyant, robotic version of Elton John in the wildest performance of the evening.

Finland should be very proud of this year’s Eurovision; the stage set was spectacular, with effects to the very high standard of a Take That concert. The main hosts were professional (although the introduction of a ‘fan’ getting her chance to host the backstage parts was silly, even for Eurovision), there were no technical problems and the frequent pyrotechnics were first class. Sir Terry Wogan was hilarious throughout his BBC commentary; slyly mocking the performers and enhancing the show ten-fold with his nonsensical comments and disbelieving laughter at the predictable voting of allied countries. During the long voting process it seemed that the UK were on track to get a disastrous nil points, and in the end only two countries awarded us any points; we received 7 from Ireland and a huge 12 points from Malta.

So, Scooch didn’t get us the win we were hoping for in 2007, but for the UK, Eurovision is becoming more about seeing the bizarre performances, eccentric entrants and predictable voting patterns Europe has to offer each year rather than winning the contest itself. At least that’s what we tell ourselves as the scores (don’t) roll in!