In something of a surprise move, SVT and the EBU today announced that Malmö will host the 2013 Eurovision Song Contest.

It had been widely assumed in fan circles that the newly completed Friends Arena in Stockholm, which will be home to next year’s Melodifestivalen final, would also play host to Europe’s largest music festival. Instead, we will find ourselves in Sweden’s third-largest city for the first time since ESC 1992.

Malmö Arena was opened in 2008 and has a notional capacity of 15,500, although SVT are already talking about having around 13,000 spectators in the venue for the three Eurovision shows.

Interestingly, unlike eurovision.tv, the article on svt.se specifically mentions the television company’s desire to limit the size of the show and make the surrounding arrangements more economically manageable – something we know to have been discussed by the Heads of Delegation in Baku. Martin Österdahl, Executive Producer of ESC 2013, commented: “Developments over recent years, with increasingly large arenas and skyrocketing costs, are not a sustainable model for ESC and have not improved the experience.” Although evidently this doesn’t apply to Melodifestivalen!

As well as cost-cutting, however, this decision makes sense at a number of other levels too. Firstly, Stockholm has been SVT’s “darling” ever since the current Melodifestivalen system was introduced in 2002, always hosting the grand final – so perhaps SVT felt they needed to throw a bone to one of their other regional centres. Secondly, Sweden has always circulated ESC hosting duties among its three biggest cities (Stockholm 1975, Gothenburg 1985, Malmö 1992, Stockholm 2000), and with Gothenburg deciding not to submit a bid this time, it could be argued it was Malmö’s “turn”.

And finally, it’s worth remembering that Melodifestivalen consistently gets higher viewing figures than ESC itself in Sweden – so even with the likely influx of foreign fans in May, it’s perhaps understandable that SVT would choose a larger venue for the former event than the latter!

Either way, come next spring we’ll all be descending on Malmö – and hoping it’ll be the welcoming party city that makes the ESC fan experience so special.