Paul the oracle octopus became headline news around the globe when he predicted correctly the results of all of Germany’s 2010 World Cup games, and threw in the correct outcome of the final to boot.
Alas, the iconic salty soothsayer passed away last October at the age of three, leaving the door wide open for other German creatures to try make a name for themselves during the recent Women’s World Cup.
First up was Paula, another octopus, but she didn’t get very far. She chose Canada to beat Germany on the tournament’s first day by taking a treat from a box marked with the maple leafed flag.
The tentacled tipster, whose gender is actually unknown, claims on her Facebook page to be psychic but her sole day of posts has me fearing for her current health.
Not to worry. Enter Nelly the 18 month old elephant. She predicts games by “trunking” the ball into the loser’s net. She did quite a good job too, getting all the German games right, including their loss against Japan.
In fact, she quite likes Japan, it seems, as the predicting pachyderm correctly went for them over the U.S.A. to win Sunday’s final, which they duly did on penalty kicks following an exciting 2-2 tie.
