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Mystic Pig Receives Death Threats After False World Cup Prediction

Mystic Marcus predicted England would beat Croatia on Tuesday, and now fans want him turned into bacon for his error.
Left image via ITV; right image via flickr user Sam Breach.

The whole of England is a little bit in their feelings today, after the national team’s devastating loss to Croatia in the FIFA World Cup semifinal match. This game was the farthest the team had made it in the international tournament in almost 30 years, and the entire country had waited on bated breath to see if they would finally bring home their second victory ever, and their first since beating West Germany in 1966. And every drunk fan in every pub across the country was scream-singing this song about a football coming home or something—it was crazy, alright?

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Then, Croatia, the underdog story of this year’s tournament, clinched the win in yesterday’s match with a second goal in extended play—and England’s fans were pissed. Heartbroken and disappointed in their team, sure—but mostly pissed. Like, blood-thirsty, fire-spitting anger. And much of their vitriol was directed at a pig named Marcus.

Mystic Marcus is an eight-year-old micro pig who had, heretofore, successfully predicted the outcome of many important world events, from Brexit to the 2016 American presidential election. On Tuesday morning, popular UK morning show This Morning hosted a segment where Mystic Marcus predicted that England would win that evening’s match against Croatia. (Marcus makes his predictions by slowly ambling toward a group of apples marked with flags of the teams’ countries skewered into them. On yesterday’s segment, he made a beeline for the England apples, making his prediction seem pretty dang certain.)

But as soon as the ref’s final whistle blew and England finished down a goal, death threats for Marcus started rolling in.

Phillip Schofield, one of the hosts of This Morning, tweeted, “Can I smell bacon?”

The show’s Twitter account posted an ominous tweet featuring a picture of a bacon sandwich with the words, “We’ll just leave this here… #ENGCRO #CROvENG #SorryMarcus”

The show’s hosts weren’t the only ones out for Marcus’ blood. Countless other disenchanted fans took to Twitter to express their grief for their team and their rage for their trusted fortune teller. Many demands for Marcus sausage were made.

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It’s at this point that we feel the need, as Americans going through our own turmoil of national identity, to say to our English friends: Ay, buddies. Mates. Take a step back and evaluate your choices. Maybe—MAYBE, I don’t know, just hear me out here—you shouldn’t have put your faith in a ruminant animal that happens to really like apples.

We’re hoping that Marcus’s performance yesterday doesn’t land him in the same situation as Paul the octopus, another psychic animal that the world’s sports fans loved to hang their dreams on who also recently met a grisly fate (although, admittedly, not because he pissed off Japanese soccer fans). England will have another shot at bringing it home at 2022's World Cup, and maybe Marcus will get it right next time—if he's not in someone's belly before then.