Billy Hearthose predicted 16 wins in a row at one point
A cat from Newry has become an international star after going viral for predicting World Cup football matches on social media.
Billy Heartnose is a two-year-old tuxedo cat who was adopted by Linka Lin and Mark Kelly and has recently become a sensation online after predicting 21 games that did not end in a draw during opening games of the 2026 tournament.
Speaking to Belfast Live, the couple said that they started making videos with Billy for a bit of fun and never thought that they would get much attention on social media. But after he got prediction correct for the Scotland game against Haiti thousands of people started to watch the videos. This got a further boost when he picked the right team for England against Croatia.
Since then hundreds of thousands of people have viewed Billy’s prediction videos and he has featured in media across the world.
The couple said: “We had been playing and interacting with Billy and putting videos up on social media with no followers or anyone really watching us as a bit of fun.
“Then after we put up a video of Billy predicting the Scotland game against Haiti all of a sudden we had 300,000 views on it! We think because it was a tough game to call people were impressed. Then after he predicted England against Croatia we got even more followers.
“While he is only able to pick winners and losers he had a brilliant record of picking 16 wins in a row before he got one wrong. We thought once he did get one wrong people would lose interest but no, they still want to see who Billy is going to pick.
“Since Billy went viral we have had media organisations from all over the world get in touch and he has been on Fox News, The New York Post and outlets in South Korea, Argentina and New Zealand.
“We are just glad that everyone is enjoying Billy’s predictions and seeing what a smart and talented cat he is.”
If you would like to follow Billy’s predictions you can do so via his Instagram page: https://www.instagram.com/billy_heartnose
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