Gianluca Bezzina will represent Malta at the 2013 Eurovision Song Contest with the song “Tomorrow”.

This was the eventual outcome of a typically lengthy and extravagant Malta Eurovision Song Contest held at the Malta Fairs & Convention Centre in Ta’ Qali.

Since you can’t fill four hours of airtime with yoghurt adverts alone, TVM also gave us a varied and baffling array of interval acts, including what appeared to be a Maltese version of “Gangnam Style”, Heilsarmee performing this year’s Swiss entry “You & Me” (still under the same name and with uniforms intact), and Kurt Calleja and some balding older man with a medley of “It’s My Life”, “Sex Bomb”, “Live Like We’re Young” and countless other pop hits.

About an hour before the end of the show, the official website eurovision.tv published an article proclaiming Amber (“In Control”) as the winner. Despite issuing a swift denial on Twitter, the article remained in place for some time afterwards – leaving ESC fans on tenterhooks waiting to see if the results had indeed been spoiled.

Previously, Swedish-based singer Kevin Borg had been seen as the the hot favourite – and indeed he duly won the televote. However, the expert jury from various ESC participant countries – which accounted for seven-eighths of the total vote, perhaps reflecting the importance juries tend to have for Maltese entries at ESC itself – conclusively preferred Bezzina’s jolly and upbeat number about a character identified as “Jeremy from I.T.”.

From the booing as the outcome of the voting became clear, some viewers wondered if the teenybopper Borg fans in the audience were planning to riot and/or assimilate. In the end, things remained calm – though a certain #esc chatter might be regretting this statement in the morning:

<Danniiboy> If Kevin doesn’t win I will get my nipples pierced tomorrow

Interestingly, if our #esc chat voting on Friday night’s semi-final had been the real thing, Gianluca would not have even qualified for the final – we placed him down in 18th with an average score of 4.08 out of 10, instead preferring the D-some threesome of Deborah C (5.71), Dorothy Bezzina (6.07) and Domenique (6.21).

Malta will perform in the first half of the second semi-final of ESC 2013, to be held on Thursday 16 May.