(CelebrityAccess) — On Friday, the European Broadcast Union announced that the Dutch city of Rotterdam has been selected as the Host City for the 65th Eurovision Song Contest in 2020, beating out its rival Maastricht in a close-run race.
The Grand Final of the Eurovision Song Contest 2020 will take place at Ahoy arena in Rotterdam on Saturday 16 May with Semi-Finals on 12 and 14 May, and will be organized by Dutch public broadcasters NPO, NOS and AVROTROS, together with the European Broadcasting Union.
A total of five Dutch cities and regions competed to host the Song Contest, which reached over 180 million viewers worldwide in 2019.
The Netherlands won the right to stage next year’s event after Duncan Laurence won the international televised talent competition in May with the song “Arcade.”
Laurence’s victory marks the first Eurovision win for the Netherlands since 1975 when Teach-In took home the top prize with “Ding-a-dong.”
Jon Ola Sand, the EBU’s Executive Supervisor for the Eurovision Song Contest, said “We’d like to thank all the Dutch cities who bid to host the 2020 Eurovision Song Contest, particularly Maastricht whose exemplary bid made the final decision extremely hard. We are also grateful to NPO, NOS, and AVROTROS who worked tirelessly to ensure that we have the best overall setup for the world’s largest live music event.”
“Rotterdam has shown fantastic enthusiasm and commitment and has the right facilities to welcome delegations from over 40 countries next May. We look forward to working with Rotterdam and NPO, NOS and AVROTROS on an incredible state-of-the-art Eurovision Song Contest in a great city next year.”
