EUROMILLIONS returns this evening with a sensational top prize of £112MILLION on offer to one lucky ticketholder.
Brits will play for the chance of scooping the mammoth EuroMillions jackpot – a sum of money that could change your life forever.
The staggering bounty comes after the lottery jackpot rolled over a whopping seven times.
The Lotto draw takes place at approximately 8.15pm this evening – and the results will be published here as soon as they are drawn.
Please gamble responsibly. And when the fun stops, stop.
Read our EuroMillions live blog below for the latest numbers…
- Henry Moore
What time is tonight's draw?
Tonight sees a massive £112m up for grabs in another huge EuroMillions draw.
But what time can you expect to find out if you are the lucky winner?
The draw will take place between 8pm and 8:30pm.
- Henry Moore
How do lottery winners get contacted?
Once you make the call, expect to receive a phone call back from a person like Andy, who will help you throughout your whole journey.
They will call you as soon as they find out that you are the EuroMillions winner.
During the call, they will plan a visit to meet with you in person, either the next day or whenever you can.
- Henry Moore
Strange ways EuroMillions and Lottery winners spent the cash
One winner even flushed her money down the toilet.
In 2014, Angela Maier reportedly flushed her €400,000 – around £303,500 at the time – winnings down the loo to stop the cash being used to pay for care home bills for her late husband.
The German jackpot winner was said to have been stumped with a bill from the home that cared for her husband before he passed away shortly after her win.
But instead of paying, she claims to have drunk five bottles of Champagne and tore up all 800 of the €500 notes she won and flushed them down the toilet.
Click here to read more weird ways people have spent their spoils.
- Joseph Gamp
Your chances of unlikely events
Experts reveal chances of unlikely events – from death by shark to winning lottery.
Number - crunching experts at cardchat.com have worked out the likelihood of some very unlikely events.
- 1000 – 1 = Seeing a shooting star.
- 37,500 in 1 = Being bitten by a snake.
- 3,700,000 in 1 = Being killed by a shark.
- 1,000,000,000,000 in 1 = Meeting your doppelganger.
- 45,000,000 in 1 = Winning the lottery.
- 500-1 = Being born with an extra toe.
Read the article in full here.
The biggest lottery prizes in history
- £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
Some of 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:
Lotto winner dubbed ‘Mr Sensible’
Millonaire 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.
When hopes become reality
Like many people who play the lottery, Patrick and Frances Connolly “always hoped” they would win but didn’t have high hopes.
But two years ago, on New Year’s Day, they scooped £114,969,775 on the EuroMillions after playing every week for years.
When the couple, from County Armagh, Northern Ireland, found out about the “life-changing” sum, they modestly celebrated with “a cup of tea and a hug”.
They told ITV: “I always hoped we would win the lottery one day, but when we did, it would be just our luck that lots of others would win on the same day with the same numbers too.
“Never in my wildest dreams did I think we would ever win almost £115 million.”
Top tips for playing the lottery
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
Selfless couple give away winnings
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
‘NO guarantee money will 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
This number has made 3,071 Lotto appearances
Number 27 has made more appearances than any other in 3,071 draws in the past ten years making it the best number to have in your row.
The number came up 399 times in the UK National Lottery, Thunderball, EuroMillions and Irish Lotto.
That is 141 more times than number 57, the unluckiest number, which was drawn just 258 times.
The second luckiest is 54, which appeared 387 times. It was followed by 29, 42, 52 and 58 in joint third on 381 times.
The next luckiest was number 20 with 378. Then came 23, with 372.
- Joseph Gamp
Dad’s pocket money led to freak win
A hospital visit to see her father, led lucky Libby Elliot, from Aberdeenshire, Scotland, to win £2,169,664 on the lottery.
Shortly before leaving, he gave his grandchildren pocket money and “two pounds pocket money” to his daughter too.
In 2013, Libby, then 57, told the Daily Record: “On a whim, I put it on the Lucky Dip on my way home.”
The next day, her dad couldn’t believe the news and was amazed that Libby was in hospital with him rather than planning ways to spend her cash.
She recalled him saying: “Look at you, you’re a multi-millionaire and yet you’re sitting here beside me.”
Libby said that memory “still makes me cry” and since then her life has changed drastically.
She went on to lose 11 stone and went “travelling the world on dream trips – from Jerusalem to Route 66 to Buenos Aires”.
- Joseph Gamp
‘Money made my close relatives demanding and greedy’
Euromillions mum Gillian Bayford was 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
Scratching for gold
Striking it rich with a scratchcard might seem like a fantasy – with most punters pocketing a couple of quid, if anything.
But some actually put you in pretty good stead of bagging the top prize.
Read more here.
- Joseph Gamp
‘I won £30k & brand new BMW on a Xmas scratchcard’
A GRATEFUL gran kicked off the 2022 in the best way possible, winning £30,000 and a brand new BMW on a scratch card.
Hanna Valarie Dewar, from Tain, in the Scottish Highlands, won big on the Cars & Cash National Lottery scratchcard, after she nearly threw the winning ticket away.
Mrs “Val” Dewar said she had decided to treat herself to the scratch card after a trip to the dentist last December and was left in disbelief after she realised she won.
The 79-year-old said that she nearly threw the winning ticket away before she realised she had won the top cash prize and a brand new BMW X2, the Daily Record reported.
She said: “I had been at the dentist that day and decided to buy myself a couple of Scratchcards to cheer myself up. I remember it because I was chatting to the lady behind the counter at Morrisons who, funnily enough, was also called Val.
“Being a few days before Christmas the shop was very busy so I decided to wait until I got home to scratch them.
“I live in a farmhouse with a big open fire and normally when I have scratched the cards, and if I haven’t won anything, I just throw them into the fire.
“Strangely, that day the fire wasn’t lit and boy am I glad about that!”
- Joseph Gamp
Explained: How long do winners have to claim their money?
Winners from different countries have different deadlines to claim their prize.
In Austria, winners have a whole three years to claim the prize before it is returned to the lottery and used to fund boosted prizes.
Belgian winners, on the other hand, only have around 140 days before the money is returned to the Belgian National Lottery.
The least amount of time to snap up the jackpot goes to France and Luxembourg.
Winners from Ireland, Portugal and Spain all have around 90 days to tell the world they’ve won.
- Joseph Gamp
Explainer: Where does all the money go?
Around £30 million is raised every week by National Lottery players for good causes – so even if you don’t win some of the country’s most vulnerable do.
Here are some of the organisations they work with:
- Arts Council England
- Sport England
- BFI
- UK Sport
- Arts Council Of Wales
- Sport Wales
- Arts Council Of Northern Ireland
Which National Lottery draw is worth playing?
The game with the best odds, in terms of winning the top prize, is the Thunderball.
According to the National Lottery website, the odds of winning the jackpots are:
- Lotto jackpot: 1 in 45,057,474.
- EuroMillions jackpot: 1 in 139,838,160.
- Set For Life top prize: 1 in 15,339,390.
- Thunderball top prize: 1 in 8,060,598.
£300,000 on a scratchcard after shielding
A COUPLE “burst into tears” when they discovered they had won £300,000 on a scratchcard after shielding for almost two years.
Louisa Tomlinson described the win as “a dream come true” after she and husband Greg endured a “really tough couple of years” while she recovered from a stroke and treatment to mend a hole in her heart.
The duo, who have five children and have been married for 22 years, now plan to achieve a lifelong dream by buying their own home.
Louisa, 57, said: “I’d just started a new job when I had the stroke, and in treating that the doctors discovered that I also had a hole in my heart.
“I haven’t worked since, and Greg, a trained electrician, had to take a part-time delivery job so he was around to look after me as I recovered.
“I’ve always dreamt of owning our own home and to be honest, over the last 18 months I’ve thought of nothing else, scouring Rightmove for the perfect little cottage.
“I knew we could never afford it but the daydreaming kept me entertained while I was shielding… this really is a dream come true.”
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