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Susan Knox & Sean Crosbie & Rachel Butler

Wild Youth frontman slams Eurovision for not giving Ireland a chance in deleted Instagram post

Wild Youth singer Conor O'Donohoe publicly aired his frustrations about not getting to the final before deleting his post.

Wild Youth's Eurovision journey came to an end on Tuesday night, as Ireland failed to reach the grand final yet again.

But O'Donohoe opted to air his frustrations in a now deleted Instagram post.

The 29-year-old claimed that the organisers "never give Ireland a chance", as the last time Ireland reached the final was 2018 and the last time an act from here won the competition was in 1996.

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O'Donohoe has since deleted the post but it has been screen-grabbed by followers and uploaded to Instagram for all to see.

A screengrab of the Instagram post was then shared on Twitter.

The full caption read: "We did everything we could. @michealkealy1 was amazing. But the truth is they never give Ireland a chance, sorry if we let you down. We tried our best."

The post has since been deleted (Buzz.ie)

Before taking to the stage for their performance, the band had said they would be hugely disappointed if they failed to make it through, and that they had "given it their all".

RTÉ's Eurovision boss Michael Kealy said of the band: "We are extremely proud of Wild Youth - they put on a brilliant performance and were fantastic representatives for Ireland."

Wild Youth's performance at Eurovision received a mixed reception online for several reasons from the song itself to O'Donohoe's eye-catching gold jumpsuit.

The jumpsuit itself was referenced by the official Eurovision Twitter account which uploaded a clip of their act with the caption: "Wild Youth from Ireland proving that there's always a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow."

The band have been heavily criticised online mainly due to the controversy over their creative director Ian Banham prior to the tournament.

The group cut all ties with Banham back in April, due to his alleged transphobic and anti-vax statements.

Their failure to qualify for Saturday's grand final follows a dismal trend for Ireland - with the most Eurovision wins with seven - who have failed to reach the grand final since 2018 when Ryan O'Shaughnessy entered with his song Together.

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