Tuesday, October 13, 2009

Chance brings luck to pub lottery players

BLANTYRE, Scotland (UPI) -- A group of regulars at a Scottish pub got lucky when the one buying the lottery ticket decided not to play the usual numbers and leave it up to chance.

The ticket turned out to be worth 4.5 million pounds ($7.2 million) -- or 500,000 pounds for each of the nine friends, The Scotsman reported.

The nine, all regulars at the Doon Inn in Blantyre, have been playing the lottery for 15 years.

Sandy Morton, who bought the winning ticket, said he was in the pub Saturday when the numbers were drawn on television. He was writing them down and at first thought the ticket had five of the numbers until someone pointed out he had written one down wrong, and they had all six.

Jim McGrail, who was laid off three months ago, said the win was a nice turn in his luck.

"I was in the house at the time of the draw, but then Sandy called me," he said. "I thought it was a wind-up. It took another six members of the syndicate to phone me before I started to believe them. I raced down to the pub to join in the celebrations."



Copyright 2009 by United Press International

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