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Not only do they give their forecasts regarding the results of matches within the framework of the 2018 World Cup football experts- a whole menagerie joined them...
The participants in the unique rating were mostly “Russians” - the Hermitage cat Achilles, the goat Zabiyaka, the dolphin Wanda, the bear Aurora, the lion Lord, the dachshund Gigolo and the horse Brant. Among the foreigners, the psychic boar nicknamed Mystical Marcus and the Croatian gibbon Kent proved themselves to be oracles.
The method by which the forecast was made was simple: on the eve of the match, the animal chose an object marked with the symbols of a particular state.
In Cassandra's shoes
Boar Mystic Marcus, British by origin, will determine the countries that will advance to the semi-finals of the championship back in mid-June.
Apples with flags were laid out in front of the animal. different countries- participants of the football championship. As a result, the wild boar “ate” Belgium, Argentina, Nigeria and Uruguay, which meant they would reach the semi-finals.
Those who listened to Marcus's forecast are biting their elbows today - of all the winning states he selected, only Belgium reached the semi-finals.
The snow-white deaf Hermitage cat-predictor Achilles is sure to win Russia in the match with the Egyptian national team. The cat's premonitions were not deceived. However, in the Sweden-Switzerland match, the blue-eyed inhabitant of the basements of the country's main museum missed - the Swedes won, although the cat chose a bowl that stood next to the Swiss flag and ate from it.
On June 24, the Samara goat Zabiyaka accurately predicted the results of the games with the teams of France and Brazil. But her hope for the victory of the Russian national team in the match with Uruguay did not come true.
Dolphin Wanda, an inhabitant of the Sochi dolphinarium, on July 1, Russia's victory over Spain in the 1/8 finals of the World Cup. Wanda was asked to choose one of two soccer balls with team names written on them. The dolphin's choice fell on the ball with the name of our team.
A day earlier, on June 30, Harry, an otter living in the Moscow Zoo, entered the competition among animal oracles. And although Harry had been very successful in his predictions three times before, betting on the victory of the Spaniards spoiled the animal’s reputation as a predictor.
When passions ran high...
By the time the quarterfinals started, the number of oracle beasts had increased dramatically. For example, they were joined by the polar bear Aurora from the Krasnoyarsk Flora and Fauna Park “Roev Ruchey”. Predator victory of the Russian national team in the quarter finals of the World Cup. Alas, the bear's prediction did not come true.
Lev Lord, an inhabitant of the Sakhalin Zoo, gives his forecast for the match between the Russians and the Croats on July 6. The animal was offered bowls of meat decorated with flags of opponents in the upcoming game. The king of beasts did not play tricks with false patriotism: he preferred a treat from the “Croatian bowl”, swallowing both the flag and the straw at the same time. And, as it turned out, he was right.
Excessive intelligence failed the oracle dachshund from St. Petersburg. A dog named Gigolo in a vessel with the Russian tricolor. It is unknown whether the representative of the equid order will continue his career as a predictor, but it is unlikely that anyone will rush to place bets based on his predictions.
The lucky gibbon Kent, who lives in Croatia, had never made a mistake in predicting how events would develop on the field until July 7th. This time it was Kent's luck - for some reason he chose a Russian doll. However, the gibbon's authority in some circles is so great that even this blatant blunder will not confuse his fans.
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Football fever for the 2018 World Cup is in full swing.
Who will become the world champion and who will be left out of the football festival?
Predicting the outcome of matches is another fun activity associated with the World and European Football Championships that has become widespread over the past decade.
Who will win the 2018 FIFA World Cup
The teams began to predict the outcome of the game for people using so-called animal oracles.
The process of predicting a match occurs in a very simple form: the animal oracle selects one of two balls (or any other object), on which the name of the country is written or the flag of the participating country is depicted.
Thus, with its choice, the oracle “predicts” victory for one or another team.
Octopus Paul
Let us remember that the tradition of predicting matches in this way began at the 2010 World Cup in South Africa. Thanks to his accurate predictions, the German octopus Paul then became a real sensation and a world celebrity.
Then other animals continued the tradition of predicting the outcome of matches.
Animal Oracles 2018
The main oracle of the 2018 World Cup was white cat named Achilles, who lives in the Hermitage in St. Petersburg.
What is known about this animal?
Achilles is a resident of St. Petersburg, he is approximately 2.5 years old. The animal is named after one of the characters ancient greek mythology. Achilles continued the path of his parents: he is in the service of the State Hermitage.
The animal serves honestly and does its job properly: it protects the masterpieces of world culture from rodents. The cat is not purebred, but beautiful, prone to excess weight, so Hermitage workers carefully monitor his diet and periodically put the cat on a diet.
According to museum staff, Achilles is a deaf cat, but it is his deafness that contributes to the development of clairvoyance. The cat really has a very keen sense of smell.
In addition, due to his deafness, Achilles is not distracted by extraneous sounds and does not experience additional stress when he is filmed by endless paparazzi and ordinary curious people.
“This happens quite often: when you lack something, it is compensated by something else,” says Maria Haltunen, deputy director of the Hermitage and spokeswoman for the guard cats. "That's why he can be called a good oracle."
The deaf cat predicts the victory of one of the teams by choosing a bowl of food (a standard technique used by animal oracles at this World Cup).
What did Achilles the cat predict?
The “career” of the Hermitage cat looks like this:
Matches of the Confederations Cup 2017 (3 correct predictions out of 4), as for the 2018 World Cup, the cat guessed 4 out of 5 matches. Thus, as of July 1, 2018, Achilles accurately predicted 7 out of 9 matches, his effectiveness is 78 percent.
But Achilles is far from the only animal that guesses the outcome of matches with amazing accuracy. In Russia alone there are at least a dozen such predictors.
So, the list of so-called oracles included the following animals: the bear Yakov Potapych from Moscow, the female tapir Cleopatra from Nizhny Novgorod, the lemur Spartak from Yekaterinburg, the Sochi otter Harry, the goat Zabiyaka from Samara.
Forecasts of Yakov Potapych
Bear Yakov Potapych is a resident of the capital and is rightfully considered a Muscovite.
Yakov Potapych was not mistaken when he predicted the victory of the Russian national team in the matches with Saudi Arabia and Egypt; he also predicted a draw in the match of such giants of world football as Portugal and Spain. In addition, the clubfoot predicted a draw in the Argentina-Iceland match.
By the way, it was Potapych who so amused many guests of the capital at the very beginning of the World Cup, when he appeared before them in the uniform of his national team. This cheerful predictor is also an unspoken symbol of Russia.
Tapir Cleopatra
And in the Nizhny Novgorod Zoo there lives a female tapir named Cleopatra. It has long become a favorite of both city residents and visitors. The animal is very sociable, easily makes contact, and recently has also made predictions for the games that take place in its hometown Nizhny Novgorod.
It is worth noting that Cleopatra accurately guessed the outcome of three matches in a row, correctly determining the winner. However, the animal made a mistake for the fourth time and, before the Argentina-Croatia match, chose a bowl on which the Argentine flag was depicted.
With her choice, Cleopatra made people understand that she was betting on the South Americans, but everything did not go according to this scenario: the game ended with a score of 0:3 in favor of the Croats.
Lemur Spartak
A lemur named Spartak, who lives in the Yekaterinburg zoo, also makes predictions for the 2018 World Cup matches.
Spartak is offered a choice of two plates with delicacies - banana or dates. The outcome of the match depends on what the lemur prefers.
Lemur has already guessed the outcome of several matches, including the victory of the Russian national team over Egypt and Saudi Arabia. But in the Russia-Spain match, Spartak behaved unpatriotically, predicting victory for the Spaniards.
As we all already know, the Russian team beat the legendary Red Fury in a penalty shootout. Therefore, the animal was wrong in its prediction.
Harry the Otter
Otter fortune teller Harry lives in sunny Sochi, the animal also guesses the outcome of the games at the 2018 World Cup.
It is worth noting that Harry is one of the five animal oracles who almost always accurately guess the results of matches.
Harry accurately predicted the defeat of the national teams of Saudi Arabia and Egypt in the games with Russia, she also indicated that the Russians would lose to the Uruguayans.
But in predicting the match between Spain and Russia, the otter also behaved unpatriotically. Two balls with images of the flags of both countries were thrown into a pool filled with water. The otter purposefully walked towards the ball with the Spanish flag.
Thus, the otter predicted defeat for his compatriots, and, as it turned out, he was wrong in his predictions. The Russian team won the game against the Spaniards.
Goat Ruffnut
The goat Zabiyaka, who lives in the Samara zoo, also gives very accurate predictions regarding the matches of the 2018 World Cup.
The animal guessed not only the matches that took place in her hometown of Samara, but also other games that were held in other cities of Russia.
But the goat's last prediction turned out to be wrong. The bully clearly made it clear that the Mexican team would beat Brazil in the eighth final. However, a miracle did not happen: the Brazilians are in the quarter finals, and the Mexicans are packing their bags and going home. The goat made a mistake in her forecast.
Dolphin predicted the match
And, of course, we must pay tribute to the dolphin with the prophetic name Wanda. The mammal lives in the Great Sochi Dolphinarium and also makes its predictions.
This is the only animal from the list of oracles that predicted the sensational victory of the Russian team in a difficult game with the Spaniards. Russian fans immediately dubbed the dolphin Wanda the most patriotic oracle of this World Cup.
Only he believed that our football players were capable of defeating one of the strongest football teams in the Old World.
There are a huge number of animals and plants in the world that serve as barometers, temperature indicators or storm predictors. The USA is famous for the legendary groundhog-weatherman Phil, and cats and dogs all over the world are excellent earthquake experts. In the world of sports, there are also animals with the gift of prediction. Before the start of the World Cup in Brazil, “Championship” recalls the most famous ones.
Octopus Paul
The German professor of predictions, the kind octopus Paul, became famous throughout the world during Euro 2008. The eight-legged oracle specialized in predicting matches of his native German national team. On the eve of matches, two transparent feeders with flags of the rival teams were placed in Paul’s aquarium, after which the octopus crawled into the one he liked, thus making his choice.
During his short career (octopuses live about five years), Paul made predictions 14 times. football matches, of which I was wrong only twice. After incorrectly predicting the Euro 2008 final match between Spain and Germany, the octopus was no longer mistaken and brilliantly guessed all the outcomes of the 2010 World Cup matches. South Africa. The final match between Spain and Holland was Paul's last and only prediction that did not include the German team.
On the day of Paul's death, October 26, 2010, flags were flown at half-mast and a book of condolences was displayed at his home aquarium in Oberhausen. At the moment, the ashes of the famous octopus are walled up in a monument depicting Paul with soccer ball, which is installed in the aquarium.
The octopus in Germany was replaced by a new predictor, this time female. An elephant named Nellie began her career as an oracle on women's championship FIFA World Cup 2011. Two gates were installed in front of Nellie, above which were the team flags. The elephant’s task was nothing less than to score a goal! The team whose goal the ball entered first was declared the loser.
Having guessed almost all the matches involving the Germans, Nelly suddenly gave the victory to the Japanese before the quarterfinal match. The forecast was very dramatic: five times the elephant was close to hitting the Japanese goal, but on the sixth projectile it still flew into the goal of the German team. Indeed, in the match the Germans were close to scoring a goal several times, but the Japanese eventually celebrated the victory, 1:0.
By the way, Nelly absolutely correctly predicted the outcome of the final Champions League match between Bayern and Borussia in favor of the Munich team.
Funtik the boar and Fred the ferret
During Euro 2012, the Ukrainians decided to give the world two new Nostradamuses at once. The first was a 400-kilogram pink boar named Funtik. Funtik made his predictions in a completely uncomplicated way - two bowls with images of national team flags were placed in front of the animal. Both bowls contained identical portions of corn sticks. The outcome of the fight depended on which of them the huge boar approached.
During the European Championship, Funtik guessed only half of the results, including a bet on Russia in the match with the Czechs. So the boar did not become a successful forecaster. But I remember that he loved to drink beer with fans.
Another fortune teller, a ferret named Fred, also told fortunes using food bowls. True, instead of corn sticks, the animal was treated to beef. Like his fellow boar, Fred only guessed half the results of the European Championships. Ferret confidently led the Portuguese and Germans to the semi-finals, but in the final, Kharkov resident Fred made a mistake, giving preference to the Italian team.
Harry the Otter
The main predictor olympic games a male otter named Harry became a resident of Sochi. At first, his girlfriend Ashley also took part in the forecasts, but the female quickly got tired of the annoying television cameras and withdrew her ceremonial responsibilities. So Harry took the rap for both.
Two balls with the names of countries were thrown into the pool. Harry was pulling one of them onto land, which was considered the predicted winner. Having made a series of successful predictions, including the victories of the Belarusian biathlete Daria Domracheva and the Japanese figure skater Yuzuru Hanyu, the male otter made a mistake in the fatal match of our hockey players with Finland.
After this, mistakes began to be made more often, but employees of the Sochi zoo, where Harry lives, said that the animal began to get tired because large quantity forecasts. In addition, Harry gained a lot of weight, as he made 4-5 predictions a day, for which he invariably received treats.
Krab Petrovich
Norwegian by origin and Belarusian by passport, the experienced sailor crab Petrovich predicted the outcome of the past hockey championship peace in Minsk. A hockey puck with flags of rival teams pasted on both sides was thrown into the aquarium of a huge sea creature. After some manipulation, Petrovich used his claw to throw the puck to the bottom of the aquarium, and the likely winner was the team whose flag remained at the top.
It is worth saying that the crab did not undertake to predict matches with the participation of his native Belarus - as they say, out of sin. And the forecast did not always turn out to be correct - in the match between the French and Canadians, Petrovich boldly bet on the latter and, as we know, he made a mistake. But he was always accurate with our team - in all matches the crab invariably bet on Russia.
Turtle Big Head
A huge sea turtle nicknamed Big Head has joined the ranks of fortune tellers. The day before the start of the World Cup in Brazil, a football goal was installed in the pool, on the net of which the flags of the participants in the opening match - the national teams of Brazil and Croatia - were fixed. The turtle gave preference to the tournament hosts, eating a tasty fish near the yellow-green flag.
Will Big Head's career be as successful as that of the legendary octopus? We'll find out very soon. If the turtle is able to guess most of the matches, then he will occupy the niche of the main oracle for a long time sports competitions. After all, everyone knows that turtles, unlike octopuses, live for more than one century.
The results of the 2018 FIFA World Cup matches are predicted not only by sports experts, but also by animals. Moreover, the latter are often more accurate. On the eve of the start of the World Cup, MIR 24 presents the most interesting forecasts of four-legged oracles.
Hippos from the Kaliningrad zoo Milya and Glyasik predicted a draw in the Russia-Saudi Arabia match. As the zoo’s press secretary, Ekaterina Mikhailova, said, in the outdoor enclosure, employees placed two portions of treats for the animals - fresh grass, vegetables, and a grain mixture. A flag symbolizing the commands was placed next to each one.
Glyasik preferred “Saudi Arabia”. Milya started with “Russia”, then tasted her husband’s portion and, after some reflection, returned to the tricolor. Zoo staff interpreted this as a draw.
He doesn’t agree with the hippos – he believes that Russia will win. The cat was offered two bowls of food, and he chose the one marked with the Russian flag. Interestingly, Achilles already has experience in predictions - last year he guessed the results of three out of four Confederations Cup games.
Stanislav Cherchesov's wards were also promised a win by Great Britain, who began to eat mealworms under the Russian flag as a whole flock.
The raccoon Nafanya from Irkutsk also agrees with them. Employees of the zoo where he lives claim that the animal has been making predictions for several years now. sports matches and so far I have never made a mistake. On the eve of the Championship, he chose a bowl of food with the Russian logo, which greatly encouraged local fans. Interestingly, Nafanya himself is very athletic. Pull-ups and jumping equipment have been installed in his enclosure, and the raccoon exercises regularly.The Russians were also promised victory by the otter Harry and the rabbit Fluff from Sochi.
Tapir Cleopatra from the Limpopo Zoo in Nizhny Novgorod will predict the winner of the match Sweden - South Korea. Zoo press secretary Anna Belyakova noted that Cleopatra will express her opinion three days before the game - June 15. The ceremony will take place in a standard way - the animal will have to choose one of two bowls of food. Meanwhile, the tapir already knows the winner of the World Cup - according to Cleopatra, the Cup will go to the Argentines.
The goat Zabiyaka from the Samara Zoo gave the victory to the German team - many experts agree with her on this.
The era of animal oracles began in 2008, when the European Football Championship took place. The octopus Paul caused a general stir. Before the match, two feeders with flags of the opposing teams were placed in his aquarium. Out of 14 predictions, Paul was wrong only twice. But two years later, during the 2010 World Cup, the octopus gained experience and made 100% accurate predictions.
Now Paul is no longer alive, but his work is continued by four-legged animals in zoos around the world. They don't lag behind either modern technologies- a resident of VDNKh intends to guess the results of all matches of the largest sports tournament.
