“I WAS DEFEATED!”

HOW THE RUNNERS-UP OF ’74 FARED AFTER EUROVISION

Classic Pop Presents / 15 Oct 2026

GIGLIOLA CINQUETTI

Italy’s first Eurovision winner at the age of 17 with 1964’s Non Ho L’Età (I’m Not Old Enough), Cinquetti was a favourite to win again 10 years later, only for ABBA to knock her into second place. For political reasons, her entry Si (Yes) was censored in her native Italy, where viewers were prohibited from seeing her performance for fear its sentiment would affect the “yes” vote in their referendum on legalising divorce.

Swapping singing for broadcasting,

Cinquetti later returned as Eurovision co-host in 1991 and today anchors a current affairs show on Italian TV.

MOUTH & MACNEAL

ABBA’s Eurovision nemeses were the Dutch duo who’d already enjoyed international success with 1972’s How Do You Do. It wasn’t Maggie MacNeal, but her boorish bear-sized partner Willem ‘Mouth’ Duyn, who made enemies of the placid Swedes at a party in Brighton on the eve of the contest, boasting he was going to win before manhandling Agnetha. Critics further blamed Duyn’s irritating clownish performance on the night as the reason they came third. MacNeal returned to represent the Netherlands as a solo artist in 1990, coming fifth. Sadly, Duyn died of a heart attack in 2004, at the age of 67.

OLIVIA NEWTON-JOHN

The Cambridge-born, Australia-raised chart star with several UK hits was favourite to follow Sandie Shaw and Lulu to a third British Eurovictory, only to reach joint fourth. Her public criticism of Long Live Love led to a media backlash, her career not recovering in the UK until 1977’s Top 10 Sam before the killer combination of the Rydell High Shake Shack and a pair of black skintight pedal-pushers made hers the most-celebrated rear in 70s pop after Agnetha’s.

In 2013, she sang Long Live Love at her show in Brighton. She died in 2022, aged 73.