Ratings success in United Kingdom
16 May 2011 at 19:27 CESTLarge audience share
According to the official BBC broadcasting figures, there were an average 9.54 million viewers watching the show in the United Kingdom. This represented an audience share of 40.4% between 8.00 pm and 11.30pm GMT.
The appearance of both Blue for the United Kingdom and Jedward for Ireland are believed to be huge contributors in attracing more viewers.
Newspaper reactions in United Kingdom
Meanwhile, the newspaper reactions have been generally positive, with the Daily Mail positive about the perfomance, and saying that Blue had done themselves proud. It was a similar story in the Metro, where the improvement on previous years results for the United Kingdom and Ireland were highlighted.
The Sun reports that Jedward's manager, and X Factor judge Louis Walsh had said "We might do a Lena, and bring Jedward back again next year to Eurovision."
They also reported that Blue had been drowning their sorrows at the after show party until 6am, quoting band member Simon Webbe as saying "It's often not really about the song, but who your neighbours are, but we are very proud of what we did."