Although last year’s British entrants, Scooch, were made mostly of mascara, plastic and reconditioned bits of Bucks Fizz, they did – on the face of it – look like human beings. If the people of Ireland decide to elect Irlande Douze Points by Dustin the Turkey to represent them this year, it will be the first animal to compete at Eurovision. Clearly, Ireland had to try a different tack to recapture their once-sure Eurovision touch.

With four victories in the five years up to 1996, Ireland were an imperial Eurovision force. That all their songs during that period were rubbish served as no impediment. Indeed, Paul Harrington and Charlie McGettigan’s Rock’n’Roll Kids was so bad, it gave rise to the conspiracy theory that Ireland were deliberately submitting awful songs so that they didn’t have to go to the expense of hosting the event again.

In fact, the country where Daniel O’Donnell, Boyzone and Westlife enjoy Beatlesque veneration is immensely proud of its Eurovision record.

So what changed? Eurovision success was never about musical merit. And in the postCeltic Tiger era, perhaps Ireland is no longer regarded as the plucky underdog. Ireland’s desperation to recapture its former Euro-glory was unwittingly summed up by Brian Kennedy’s 2006 submission, Every Song is a Cry for Love. Crowbarring every Irish Tourist Board cliché into three dismal minutes, Dervish performed a fiddly-diddly atrocity last year called They Can’t Stop the Spring, making Scooch look good by coming bottom.

Assuming that the Irish can countenance the idea of following a metaphorical turkey with a real one, this might be the year of the ironic entry. If Zig & Zag’s avian chum flies to Belgrade, he may be the first of many postmodern contestants sent to provide light amusement while the increasingly dominant Eastern European juries do what the rest have been doing for decades – vote for each other.

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