Celebrate 3rd Birthday with Ł66 million

The Euromillions lottery is celebrating its 3rd birthday on Friday 9 February 2007 with a guaranteed £66million jackpot. The jackpot can be won by any player from the nine countries that participate in EuroMillions namely Austria, Belgium, France, Ireland, Luxembourg, Portugal, Spain, Switzerland and here in the UK.

You should see lots of press and TV advertising for the event, including animated lottery balls bouncing up and down across your screen. This draw is a one-off meaning the jackpot must be won, so if no one matches the five numbers, plus two lucky stars (odds of 1:76,275,360) the prize will roll down to the next prize level, for which you have to match five balls and only one lucky star (odds of 1:5,448,240).

This £66m jackpot is pretty big by Euromillions standards. The biggest ever win by one ticket was £77m won by an Irish lady in 2005. On 17 November 2006 the jackpot stood at over £120 million and no-one matched the jackpot so the money went to the next prize level, where 20 people across Europe took home prizes of £6,375,135 each. Seven of these winners were from the UK so we have a pretty good record when it comes to big “must be won” jackpots.

Every country that participates in EuroMillions, by encouraging their players to buy a ticket hopes it will be one of their players that scoops the prize. So look out for the headline on Saturday that says “UK winner of £66m Euromillions Draw”. It can only be you if you buy at least one ticket, costing £1.50 from your usual lottery ticket seller, and do so before 7pm on Friday 9 Feb. You can watch the draw on Sky’s Challenge TV at 9.55pm, and results are posted on-line from 10pm.

- 5th February, 2007.