The Croatian national selection, Dora, is back for 2022 with 14 artists competing to represent Croatia at Eurovision 2022. I enjoyed Dora last year, it was quite competitive, and I thought the winner was really good (and it’s criminal it narrowly missed out on a place in the Eurovision grand final).

The quality this year looks to be broadly good though perhaps not (yet) with a standout song. That of course makes the national final more interesting as it’s a more open field and unclear who will win. With six national finals to choose from on Saturday 19 February, I think I may choose to focus on Dora as it’s the one I am least sure who will win (well, not including San Marino as anything can happen there!)

The (fan) favourites

While it is an open field, these following three occupy the top three positions in the Eurovision scoreboard app – it’s not always accurate, but perhaps gives sense of who the top contenders might be.

Mia Negovetić “Forgive Me (Oprosti)”

Mia currently stands at top of scoreboard app and with good reason – this is a strong ballad, she’s got good vocals, and she did in fact come joint first in Dora 2020 but lost out to Damir Kedžo following the tie-break rules. In the end, she wouldn’t have gone to Eurovision even if that had gone in her favour, so maybe the stars are aligning for her this year.

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Marko Bošnjak “Moli za nas”

Marko, a Croatian singer born in Bosnia, is currently in second place in the scoreboard app. He’s a former winner of a Serbian TV singing contest, so one trusts his live vocal is good. This Croatian language song feels very atmospheric – but it’s no typical Balkan ballad – it has more modern tempo and instrumentation though with a strong focus on Marko’s vocal. It’s had the most YouTube views of these top 3 as well – so one to watch.

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Bernarda “Here for Love”

It’s not surprising to find this high up in the app scoreboard – it’s an uptempo female bop though, if I’m honest, not the strongest nor the most original I have heard but is catchy. There’s a bit of gospel in there too (just to through a few Eurovision favourites in there) but the instrumentation/backing track sounds a little cheap (in my view). Still, it’s all about the live performance and Swiss-Croatian Bernarda might pull it off and pull in the public vote.

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Dora 2022 takes place from 7.10pm on Saturday 19 February. You can watch the show via the broadcaster’s YouTube channel.