THE LOTTO draw returns tonight with a tasty £7.5million waiting to be scooped by a lucky Brit ticketholder.
Tonight's National Lottery jackpot is now a rollover after no-one scooped the top prize in Wednesday's draw.
No-one matched all six main numbers to win the jackpot and no ticket-holder matched five numbers plus the bonus ball to scoop £1 million.
A total of 40 ticket-holders matched five numbers to win £1,750, while 2,889 matched four numbers to win £140 each.
Saturday's draw takes place at 7.45pm, followed by Thunderball at 8.15pm.
Please gamble responsibly. And when the fun stops, stops.
Read our EuroMillions blog below for the latest results and updates..
- Joseph Gamp
‘Money made my close relatives demanding and greedy’
Euromillions mum Gillian Bayford is locked in a family feud over her share of a £148million jackpot.
Gillian, 44, accused her dad Ian McCulloch, 72, of trying to seize control of the fortune she won with her ex Adrian Bayford, 46.
The Dundee mum of two blasted Ian, mum Brenda and brother Colin, 42, saying: “It made them bitter and greedy.”
And she told how she gave them a £20million slice of her fortune — only for them to come back for more.
Gillian, who runs a property firm in Dundee, said: “It’s upsetting and it’s raw. The money was supposed to make everybody happy.
“But it’s made my close relatives demanding and greedy.”
- Joseph Gamp
An Englishwoman’s home is her castle
A National Lottery winning dinner lady still lives in her council house, shops in Primark and drives a Kia despite bagging £1.8million.
Trish Emson, 51, explained money or her millionaire status did not change her or her partner Graham Norton, also 51, who still works as a decorator.
The down-to-earth pair have even managed to keep their teenage son Benjamin, 17, in check – and don’t even give him pocket money.
The modest mum, from Rotherham, South Yorkshire, said: “Being rich doesn’t make you posh or a better person.
“I don’t like showing off and bragging about money and I can’t be posh anyway.
“To look at me you wouldn’t think I was a millionaire, but if I have to dress up I feel fake, I prefer my jeans,” she told The Mirror.
- Joseph Gamp
Money doesn’t buy happiness
Martyn and Kay Tott got the shock of their lives when they realised they’d won £3million back in 2001 – six months after buying the ticket.
By the time they saw an appeal for the winner to come forward, they couldn’t find the ticket.
After 45 agonising days of deliberating, Camelot told the devastated couple that they weren’t going to receive the cash.
“Having that money taken away was torture,” Martyn told the Mail on Sunday.
“For a long time I lost sight of who I was and what I believed in. But I can honestly say I’m glad I didn’t get the £3million now.
“There is no guarantee it would have brought me happiness.”
- Joseph Gamp
What happens to unclaimed prizes?
Any cash that isn’t claimed after a total of 180 days from a game played in the UK goes to National Lottery projects across the country.
Folks in Ireland have just half that time to claim too, with only 90 days before the prize money is off the table.
Once the claim period is over, the ticket officially expires and the owner of the lottery ticket will no longer be able to claim any of their winnings.
But after that time has expired, any unclaimed prizes, plus any interest they might have accumulated in that time, are allocated to the National Lottery’s Good Causes fund instead.
This will usually then go on to help fund things like sport programmes or local community buildings or other projects.
- Joseph Gamp
Explained: Who was Lee Ryan?
Ex-jailbird Lee Ryan scooped the £6.5million jackpot just 17 weeks after the lottery was launched on November 14 1994. He made headlines when it emerged he was accused of handling stolen cars and was imprisoned for 18 months after his huge payout.
Lee then spent a decade living the high life and splashed his car on luxury cars, a helicopter and a £2million mansion.
But Lee ended up penniless, spent two years living on the street and shacked up in a tiny flat in London he shared with homeless pals.
“The money was cursed because I took the p**s out of God when I asked him to make me a multimillionaire. My cellmate warned me to be careful what I wished for,” he said.
Lee ended up splitting with Karen Taylor, his girlfriend of eight years, and moved to London where he met a 25-year-old from Kyrgyzstan.
They took an ill-fated trip to the Central Asian country where Lee attempted to invest the last of his winnings in property.
But he returned empty-handed, claiming to have been stitched up by investors following the Kyrgyzstan revolution in 2010.
- Joseph Gamp
Who are the biggest Euromillions winners in history?
Your chances to win may be remote but if you do you could win big.
Here are some of the record prizes one by UK winners in the past:
- Joseph Gamp
Biggest lottery payouts of all time
- £1.308 billion (Powerball) on January 13 2016 in the US, for which three winning tickets were sold, remains history’s biggest lottery prize
- £1.267 billion (Mega Million) a winner from South Carolina took their time to come forward to claim their prize in March 2019 not long before the April deadline
- £633.76 million (Powerball draw) from a winner from Wisconsin
- £625.76 million (Powerball) Mavis L. Wanczyk of Chicopee, Massachusetts claimed the jackpot in August 2017
- £575.53 million (Powerball) A lucky pair of winners scooped the jackpot in Iowa and New York in October 2018
The odds of winning the Millionaire Maker
According to the EuroMillions website, there is a 1 in 1,900,000 chance that a player could win the Millionaire Maker game on a Tuesday.
This shrinks to 1 in approximately 2,250,000 if there is a rollover – meaning no one has won the previous draw’s jackpot.
On a Friday, it’s estimated that there is a 1 in 2,950,000 chance of winning a guaranteed £1million.
If there is a quadruple rollover, the odds could fall to 1 in 3,400,000.
Winning the game depends on the number of payslips sold so the odds fluctuate from game-to-game.
The odds can also change if there is a special event.
In March 2019, EuroMillions created 40 UK millionaires in a one-off special draw.
‘I won £1m on the lottery at 22 and still shop at Asda & Primark’
Roofer Jamie Heavens, then-22-year-old, went to work at his dad Mark’s roofing company in Dorset, near where he lives, and started his hands-on job.
After being sent off to work on another site, he stopped off at Romsey Services off the M27 for fuel and also bought a scratchard.
“I scratched it off in a layby and was stunned when it revealed I’d won £1m,” he said.
He kept it quiet from his colleagues – telling only his uncle and wife-to-be.
However, despite winning big, Jamie said: “Danielle still buys me jogging bottoms from Primark. I go out and graft everyday so she knows I will get them filthy. There’s no point in her getting me really smart ones, they would just get wrecked.”
Wife Danielle is still working as a receptionist at a garage whereas Jamie set up his own company, a roadside recovery service.
Read the article in full here.
- Joseph Gamp
Unlucky lottery numbers
Let’s breakdown the unluckiest numbers:
- 24 and 58 drawn on 1.21% of all draws.
- 4, 26, 38 and 65 on 1.17% of all draws.
- 51 and 35 on 1.06% of all draws.
- And lastly, the unluckiest numbers are 46 and 34 on 1.02% of all draws.
Over £1.8 billion raised for National Lottery Projects
From total ticket sales of £8,373.9 million in the year ending 31 March 2021:
- £1,887.5 million was raised for National Lottery projects
- £4,854.7 million was paid to players in prizes
- £1,004.8 million went to the Government in Lottery Duty
- £275.9 million was earned by retailers in commission
List: National Lottery stats
- Six Millionaires are made every week
- The luckiest postcode is Birmingham with 119 millionaires
- The luckiest profession is building
- There are 6 million winners a week
- £56 billion paid out in prizes
- Over £34 million goes to National Lottery Projects every week
- Most Millionaires celebrate with a cup of tea
What happens if no one claims a prize?
If no UK players come forward within 180 days then the prize money, plus all the interest it has generated while it is held in trust, goes to National Lottery-funded projects across the UK.
The National Lottery have said: “Our players change the lives of individuals as well as communities by raising, on average, over £33 million for National Lottery-funded projects every week.”
Mum scooped £300,000 on Lottery scratch card
A mum realised she had won £300,000 on a National Lottery scratch card after initially believing her winnings were just £1,000.
Sandra Davine only discovered her huge winnings after a life-changing phone call to a lottery line operator in December last year.
Sandra declared that she thought she had won £1,000 – enquiring as to how it could be claimed.
But unbeknown to her, her day was about a get a lot better as the phone line operator confirmed that she had actually scooped a whopping £300,000.
A stunned Sandra, of Renfrewshire, Scotland, can be heard saying: “You must be joking. There’s no way.”
Mr Sensible
Millionaire Lotto builder Steve Thomson has been dubbed “Mr Sensible” by pals after investing a chunk of his £105million win with the Queen’s bank – and looks set for another mega payout.
The former white van man and wife Lenka put “tens of millions” into a trust with Her Majesty’s favoured firm Coutts & Co following his 2019 EuroMillions win.
A £30million investment could see the Thomsons bag a staggering £90million over the next 20 years – almost as much as their original win.
The millions of pounds invested in the couple’s two separate trusts are invested in stocks, shares and property.
Friends have dubbed Steve, originally from Selsey, West Sussex, “Mr Sensible” for not squandering his lottery cash unlike some infamous winners.
It came after The Sun revealed how modest Steve finally splashed out £4.5million on a new home after taking more than a year to leave his £150,000 council house.
- Joseph Gamp
Count your lucky stars
According to the stars, it seems that some of us are much more likely to get it than others.
Leo – Oh, Leo we knew you’d be one of the lucky ones. You always look good, have a string of admirers and just tend to always be prowling on the bright side of the street.
Virgo – It’s no coincidence that planner extraordinaire is one of the luckiest signs of the zodiac. Their MI5-level attention to detail and incredible work ethic may make it seem as if things just fall in their lap.
Scorpio – They’ll often find themselves in the right place at the right time as if by magic, much to the annoyance of some less fortunate souls.
- Joseph Gamp
A life-changing amount
A £115million jackpot is probably enough to not just change your life, but the lives of everyone you’ve ever cared about too.
Which is probably why Frances and Patrick Connolly decided to give over half of their winnings to 175 people.
“We won £114,969,775.70 and we have given away more than half,” Frances said last year.
“That’s £60million-worth of love. And the thing that makes me even happier is that every single person we gave money to has passed some of it on to other people. I can’t think of a day since winning the Lottery that I haven’t smiled.”
Read more here.
- Joseph Gamp
Pictured: The Lottery timetable
There is a draw happening six nights a week, apart from Sundays.
Here is a timetable for all UK lottery games including Lotto, EuroMillions and Set For Life and what day they happen on.
- Joseph Gamp
‘Our life fell apart’
Dave and Angela Dawes, 53, cashed in their prize in 2011, buying Tom Jones’ former home for £4m in East Sussex, as Britain’s seventh biggest winners.
Speaking at the time of their win the couple, who had only played twice before, said that they were going to have the wedding of their dreams.
Angela enjoyed a new engagement ring, and the couple planned to to buy properties in London and abroad and were looking forward to a trip to Las Vegas and a skiing holiday in Switzerland.
But the couple’s fortunes have dramatically changes in the ten years since their win, with court battles and dramatic home raids turning the tide.
Initially they splurged £4.5million on a flat in Fulham, West London just ten minutes from Chelsea’s Stamford Bridge stadium for football mad Mr Dawes, 57.
The couple then swapped London life for village bliss in East Sussex, and enjoyed a quiet life spending their millions.
But then Dave’s son Michael also took his dad and stepmother to court after they refused to stop coughing up for him to lunch at the Ritz.
- Joseph Gamp
Odds revealed for scratchcards
Thankfully, experts have crunched the numbers to reveal the odds of bagging a win – and the answer might surprise you.
According to Oddschecker, the best scratchcard to snap up is £500 Loaded with odds of just 1 in 3.15.
For just a fiver you could be in the running for £500.
In second place, with the same odds, is Full of £500s which also has a top prize of £500.
Cashword Multiplier follows close behind, which sees punters scratch off letters to reveal symbols to create full words.
- Joseph Gamp
Ghosthunters
A woman who scooped £10,000 a month on the National Lottery Set For Life has quit her job to become a ghost hunter with her husband.
Part-time paranormal investigator Laura Hoyle, 39, has decided to ditch her day job to pursue her spooky passion with Kirk Stevens, 37, after their big win.
The 39-year-old is used to shocks – after realising she had landed the life-changing amount of money when she initially thought she had only won a fiver.
Laura was able to immediately jack in her job at a logistics firm, after realising the cash could allow her to concentrate on her ghost-hunting hobby full-time.
Read more here.
- Joseph Gamp
The magic winning formula
Have you ever wondered the secrets to winning big in the lottery? Is it pure luck or is there a system to it…?
- Avoid computer picks. It lowers your odds of winning.
- On scratchcards, try buying 10 of one ticket instead of several different tickets.
- Mix up your numbers.
- Even it out – Don’t pick all odd or all even numbers.
- Split from the crowd, so don’t play patterns.
- Apparently, you should avoid anniversaries, birthday’s and dates.
- Avoid playing winning numbers that have been drawn before, because every combination has a chance of coming up once every half a million drawings.
- Joseph Gamp
‘Our life fell apart’.
Dave and Angela Dawes, 53, cashed in their prize in 2011, buying Tom Jones’ former home for £4m in East Sussex, as Britain’s seventh biggest winners.
Speaking at the time of their win the couple, who had only played twice before, said that they were going to have the wedding of their dreams.
Angela enjoyed a new engagement ring, and the couple planned to to buy properties in London and abroad and were looking forward to a trip to Las Vegas and a skiing holiday in Switzerland.
But the couple’s fortunes have dramatically changes in the ten years since their win, with court battles and dramatic home raids turning the tide.
Initially they splurged £4.5million on a flat in Fulham, West London just ten minutes from Chelsea’s Stamford Bridge stadium for football mad Mr Dawes, 57.
The couple then swapped London life for village bliss in East Sussex, and enjoyed a quiet life spending their millions.
But then Dave’s son Michael also took his dad and stepmother to court after they refused to stop coughing up for him to lunch at the Ritz.
- Joseph Gamp
Unclaimed money goes a long way
Any cash that isn’t claimed after a total of 180 days from a game played in the UK goes to National Lottery projects across the country.
Folks in Ireland have just half that time to claim too, with only 90 days before the prize money is off the table.
Once the claim period is over, the ticket officially expires and the owner of the lottery ticket will no longer be able to claim any of their winnings.
But after that time has expired, any unclaimed prizes, plus any interest they might have accumulated in that time, are allocated to the National Lottery’s Good Causes fund instead.
This will usually then go on to help fund things like sport programmes or local community buildings or other projects.
- Joseph Gamp
Easy steps for tonight’s EuroMillions
- Pick 5 numbers from 1-50 and two Lucky Stars from 1-12. Or try a Lucky Dip for randomly selected numbers.
- Choose to play on a Tuesday or Friday – or both, then the number of weeks you’d like to play.
- You can play up to seven lines of numbers and buy up to 10 play slips at a time.
- You’re all good to go!
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