Moscow: As everybody knows that Russia's football team has failed to claim a single win in eight months but things could be change according to a reportedly clairvoyant cat who forecasted a tremendous  victory for the host side in the very first World Cup match.

Today Russia will lock the horn with Saudi Arabia in opening match of the football tournament on Thursday evening.

Achilles which is a deaf white cat and the official fortune-teller animal for the tournament, on Wednesday picked a bowl of food bearing the host's flag rather than that of Saudi Arabia.

The blue-eyed feline is frequently part of a team of dozens of cats that guard Saint Petersburg's Hermitage museum from rodents but is playing a new role for the football event.

"Achilles is already used to the public and shouldn't be too stressed," asserted vet Anna Kondratyeva, who manages the animals asserted.

According to Zee news The cat follows in the tentacle-prints of Paul the Octopus who became a star in 2010 after forecasting winners for that year's World Cup by selecting one out of two boxes containing food.

The hosts Russia, who is all set to take on Saudi Arabia in the Thursday curtain raiser match, required all the moral support they can receive as they advance into the event without a win in seven meetings.