Pesto, the king penguin chick at Sea Life Melbourne Aquarium, chose the Sydney Swans bucket in a pre-match fish-bucket stunt. The Swans did not win: Brisbane beat Sydney by 60 points in the 2024 Toyota AFL Grand Final.
Which team did Pesto pick?
In the lead-up to the 2024 Grand Final, aquarium staff presented Pesto with two buckets of fish, one marked for Sydney and one for Brisbane. Pesto waddled to the Swans bucket and ate fish from it, making Sydney his playful pick. PerthNow reported the stunt on September 27, 2024; ABC’s Behind The News described the same choice in its Newsbreak that day.
The setup was a light-hearted viral moment, not a scientific forecast or evidence that a penguin could assess the teams. Contemporary coverage framed it as a prediction, but the selection was simply which fish bucket Pesto approached.
Who won the 2024 AFL Grand Final?
Brisbane defeated Sydney on September 28, 2024. The AFL’s official match record lists the final score as Brisbane 18.12 (120) to Sydney 9.6 (60), a 60-point Lions win. Pesto’s Swans selection did not match the result.
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| Pre-match pick | Official result |
|---|---|
| Pesto chose Sydney’s bucket, according to PerthNow’s September 27, 2024 report. | Brisbane 18.12 (120), Sydney 9.6 (60), according to the AFL’s official match page. |
Who is Pesto?
Pesto was a king penguin chick living at Sea Life Melbourne Aquarium when the 2024 prediction stunt took place. The aquarium’s viral penguin was also covered by the Associated Press on September 20, 2024. That report said he weighed 22 kilograms (49 pounds) at nine months old and relayed the aquarium’s claim that his online videos had received more than 1.9 billion views; the view figure was a reported reach number, not an independently audited count. Those are dated 2024 figures, not current measurements or viewing totals.
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- 100% HAND STITCHED – To ensure this ball maintains its shape and size, its stitching is done by hand. This luxury technique creates an Aussie Rules footy ball which can be used throughout all intense AFL training drills without suffering panel separation.
- LATEX BLADDER – With a bladder produced from high-quality latex, you can rely on this Aussie Rules football training ball to retain the optimum air pressure level for a considerably long amount of time, meaning you can spend more time on the training field.
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