Durban octopus predicts rugby outcome

An Octopus at the uShaka Marine World in Durban predicts the winner of the Rugby World Cup quarter-final, between South Africa and Japan. Nqobile Mbonambi African News Agency (ANA)

An Octopus at the uShaka Marine World in Durban predicts the winner of the Rugby World Cup quarter-final, between South Africa and Japan. Nqobile Mbonambi African News Agency (ANA)

Published Oct 18, 2019

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Durban - DURING the 2010 FIFA World Cup, a German octopus named Paul made eight match predictions, which all came true.

Paul was presented with two boxes containing food.

The boxes were identical except each had the flag of a competing nation.

Whichever box Paul ate from first, was considered his prediction for the country that would win the match.

Sadly Paul expired a little while ago but he left behind a youngster (still to be named) who has apparently inherited his clairvoyance skills.

On Tuesday, an octopus at uShaka Marine World predicted that South Africa would be knocked out of the 2019 Rugby World Cup quarter-final, against host nation Japan, on Sunday in Tokyo.

KZN’s unnamed octopus was also presented with two containers filled with an equal amount of food.

One had the South African flag, the other the Japanese flag.

On three occasions, it lunged toward the Japanese container - while South Africa’s food box settled at the bottom of the enclosure.

It’s not a good omen for the Boks, who will be knocked out of the tournament if they lose to Japan.

But all is not lost.

A week before this year’s tournament, Japan used two octopuses which predicted they would not advance to the knock-out stage.

According to the sea creatures, Japan should have lost to Russia, Samoa and Scotland but they won all these matches.

However, octopuses did predict the win against Ireland.

The match will be screened on Sunday at 12.15pm on SS 201.

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