GREECE: Two winners share €18.4m Joker jackpot

Two lucky winners from Pella, Macedonia, and Corinth, Peloponnese shared last week’s near-record Joker prize of 18.4 mln euros, the second biggest payout ever by the recently privatised OPAP gaming giant.
Nearly 5 mln punters in Greece and Cyprus challenged their luck after 15 consecutive jackpots since September 11 and the total amount placed in bets was almost 40 mln euros. The lucky numbers that instantly changed the two winners’ lives and made them richer by 9.2 mln euros each were: 9, 14, 20, 24, 30 and the Joker number was 16.
This is the second largest Joker amount ever awarded in Greece, after the 19.2 mln prize that three people split in April 2010. In 2006, three winners shared 14 mln euros, while in January 2009, one person won the 11 mln euro jackpot, the largest sum awarded to a single player.
The two players bet 10 and 11 euros and according to the bet shop owners in Pella and Corinth, they did not even pick the lucky numbers on their own and allowed the OPAP machines to pick a random number.