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Lottery experts reveal the Euromillions draw you should ALWAYS play, plus the must-know strategy behind picking numbers
GOT that Friday Euromillions feeling? Before popping to the shop to buy your ticket, here are the crucial rules and hacks you need to know.
Top lottery experts have revealed five brilliant tips for playing ahead of tonight’s battle for the mega £34million jackpot.
Millions of us buy a EuroMillions ticket each week, locking horns with other players to try and land a huge windfall.
You pick five numbers from 1-50 and two lucky stars from 1-12, or you can choose a lucky dip – which is when the numbers are randomly selected for you.
The jackpot up for grabs tonight is £34million – but while that’s a huge amount to win, it isn’t as big as other recent games.
An enormous £210million jackpot was won earlier this month by a French ticket-holder, making them immediately richer than the likes of superstars Adele, Harry Kane and Dua Lipa.
It pays to get clued up on all the Euromillions small print you may not know about – otherwise you could risk losing out on a massive win.
Here’s your ultimate Euromillions hacks and tips guide to playing.
Make sure you gamble responsibly and only gamble with money you can afford to lose. Set a money limit before playing.
Winning the lottery should be life-changing, but it can spell trouble for your relationship.
Some couples have split shortly after a huge Euromillions win, like Gillian and Adrian Bayford, who divorced just 15 months after their win.
But splitting the winnings could turn messy. Technically, whoever bought the ticket is the owner – so if someone else bought the ticket, the money is theirs in theory.
If you’re married, this can make splitting the winnings tricky.
Rachel Spencer Robb, a partner in family law with Clarion Solicitors, says: “If one person in a marriage buys a winning ticket, the money is technically theirs.
“But if they later split up, the winnings should go into the pot of assets to be shared.”
That doesn’t mean they’ll automatically be split half and half. Lots of factors are considered, so one person could end up with less.
It’s also a different matter for the quarter of couples who live together but aren’t married.
Then, the person who didn’t buy the ticket isn’t legally entitled to a penny if they split up.
Rachel says: “It doesn’t matter how long they’ve been together, there’s no such thing as a common law husband or wife.
“One way around this is to sign a Living Together Agreement when you are still a couple, which lays out who gets what in the event of a split.”
Rachel says it is sensible for anyone playing the lottery or Euromillions with a partner, married or not, to draw up this little-known agreement or at least have some discussions about how any win would be split.
It may sound over the top, but with more than four in ten marriages ending in divorce, it’s a smart move.
YOU'VE got to be in it to win it.
Every time you buy a ticket the odds of winning increase.
But WARNING – only spend what you can afford. At the end of the day, it’s down to luck.
This is why some people prefer to be part of a syndicate, where multiple tickets are bought.
While this means you’ll have to share the pot, the odds become more favourable each ticket you buy.
A lottery syndicate is when a group of people club together and put money into a pot for lottery tickets.
One person will be in charge of buying the tickets and sharing out the winnings. They are called the syndicate manager.
Joining a syndicate is a good move as it should increase your chance of winning.
This is because you’re usually buying a lot more tickets in a group – and of course, the only real way you can boost your chances of winning is to buy more tickets.
In fact, around one in five top prizes are won by syndicates.
But be aware of the syndicate rules.
Only one person, the syndicate manager, is paid.
They are responsible for divvying out the winnings.
To avoid problems, Simon Horne from Allwyn UK, the National Lottery operator which runs Euromillions in the UK, urges players to draw up an agreement and make everyone sign it.
He says: “Then if there’s any complications down the line, everyone knows where they stand.”
Download this contract on the National Lottery site and get each player to read and sign it.
A DAD went from battling cancer to winning a £1million Euromillions jackpot in a heartwarming stroke of luck.
Paul Harvey from Attleborough, Norfolk, scooped £1million on the lottery on July 4.
Paul, 51, has had a tough couple of years following treatment for bowel cancer.
But he is now hoping for some happier times with his two children after scooping the massive prize.
He broke the news to his son, and they started laughing hysterically and jumping around the kitchen, Paul said.
“I wanted to tell the kids in person so when my son got home I set up my phone to record it,” he said.
The dad explained: “Life hasn’t always been easy, but the kids mean the world to me, and they always come first.
“We have never been away abroad together, and I would love to take them both to Greece. But first we need to get our passports!”
As well as a dream holiday together, Paul wants to buy his daughter a second-hand car, a Fiat 500, so she can learn to drive.
He also hopes to help them kickstart their careers as they both near the end of full-time education.
Paul said: “I am so proud of what the kids have achieved already in life. They both have big ideas about what they want to do when they leave school, and I cannot wait to help them in their chosen careers.”
There’s a type of Euromillions game that is the “best” type of draw to be part of, according to lottery expert The Lottery Guy.
He chooses to remain anonymous but has been running his blog, Lottery Guy, since 2004, where he dishes out lottery tips to help players win big.
The best game to play, according to Lottery Guy, is the rare “Must Be Won” draws.
This is when the jackpot has rolled over to hit €250million – around £216million – which is the highest it can reach.
Then, if no one wins the £216million jackpot for a further four consecutive games, it must be paid out. This is called the “Must Be Won” draw.
“That’s when it can ‘roll down’ to the lower prize levels, meaning people can win big without having to match all the numbers,” explains Lottery Guy.
“The last time this happened 20 people got to share the big jackpot by only matching five main and one lucky number.”
These kind of draws mean that it is more likely that you could win a big prize – although it is also more likely you’ll have to share it.
Of course, players will be desperate to know the trick to picking the winning numbers.
But there’s no such thing as lucky or winning numbers – statistically, each number has an equal chance of being drawn.
The real trick here is to pick numbers that players are least likely to pick.
You don’t want other people picking your numbers, because if you are lucky enough to win in tonight’s game, that will mean you have to split the prize with other players.
One of the main ways to do this is to avoid number patterns.
That’s because humans are really good at picking numbers based on a pattern – even if you don’t realise you’re doing it. So it’s better to pick a random selection of numbers.
Of course, you can pick a lucky dip to do this for you.
But there are more fun ways to pick random numbers.
Ben Parker, a senior lecturer in statistics at Brunel University of London, says you could use the phone book trick to selecting your numbers
“Pick random phone numbers in your phone book, and look at the last two digits,” he says.
“If those two digits are between 32 and 50, then keep it, otherwise pick another random phone number.”
Why not create your own random lottery machine and get the kids involved for a fun game? “You could get a load of ping pong balls, number them, then pick them at random,” he said.
If you don’t have ping pong balls hanging around the house, you could draw numbers from a hat.
This won’t increase your chances of winning – but it does increase the likelihood of picking random numbers and if you win, you could keep the entire pot.
Everyone is using ChatGPT these days – but could it be a great way of picking your lottery numbers?
You might think that using the handy AI tool is a good way of picking random numbers, but Ben warned against it.
“Chat GPT is terrible at maths,” he said. “It would just pick random numbers that have been seen elsewhere on the internet.
“It would probably pick last week’s lucky numbers because it knows those were good – and it will try to please you in some ways.”
QUIT your job, travel round the world, buy a private island… what would you do with £172million?
You’d better get planning, there are ways to boost your chances of walking away with the ENTIRE EuroMillions prize.
Never pick the ‘right’ numbers
The trick is to pick numbers that players are least likely to pick.
One of the main ways that you can avoid picking other people’s numbers is to pick numbers on the left of the grid, and avoid those on the right.
That’s because studies show that people naturally gravitate towards the right-hand side.
Avoid birthday numbers
It may be tempting to pick yours and your loved one’s birthday dates as your main numbers with the hope they bring you luck.
But the Lottery Guy said it’s best to avoid this tactic.
That’s because there will be a greater number of people picking numbers 1-31.
“Avoiding these numbers doesn’t increase your chance of winning, but if you do win, you’re much less likely to split the prize with other winners.”
Pick ‘unpopular’ numbers
There are no “lucky” numbers you can pick to boost your chances.
But Lottery Guy said a good idea would be to pick “unpopular” numbers in your ticket.
Unpopular numbers are those which run from 32-50, because they fall outside of the birthday date numbers.
It makes sense to choose these numbers, because fewer players will be picking them.
That means that if you win a share of the winnings, there will be fewer people with the same unpopular numbers on their ticket.
Play on Tuesdays
You have to be in it to win it, so if you want the chance of scooping a jackpot, you must buy a ticket.
But certain days are better than others to buy a ticket.
Lottery Guy said Tuesday is actually the best day to buy a ticket over Friday.
He said: “With EuroMillions, Friday is the much more popular day, so you’ve got more competition on a Friday.
“Consider focusing on the Tuesday draw if you want to keep more of that jackpot for yourself.”
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