Sales soar ahead of £85m lottery

Coleen McLoughlin is promoting the draw to players in the UK

The biggest ever British lottery win could take place later on Friday with an estimated jackpot of £85m up for grabs in the EuroMillions draw.

The draw, run by the National Lottery in conjunction with operators in eight European countries, has not seen a winner for the past nine weeks.

Ticket sales are on course to be more than 300% higher than normal, the UK organiser Camelot has said.

The potential jackpot is also the biggest in European lottery history.

It beats the £79m won by Ireland's Dolores McNamara in the EuroMillions draw last July.

Players are required to match five main numbers from one to 50, plus two Lucky Star numbers from one to nine.

Coleen McLoughlin, girlfriend of England footballer Wayne Rooney, has been chosen to promote the draw in the UK.

Miss McLoughlin, whose shopping sprees have been the subject of a series of tabloid articles, said: "I've got my fingers crossed for a UK winner - if they strike lucky on Friday night, think of the position they'll be playing in the rich list league table."

Sales soar

The EuroMillions draw is also open to players in Austria, Belgium, France, Ireland, Luxembourg, Portugal, Spain and Switzerland.

"Tickets are selling like hot cakes up and down the country - and across the other eight participating countries in Europe," a spokesperson for the UK's National Lottery said.

Tickets for the draw can be bought in nine European countries

If a single UK ticket-holder wins the estimated jackpot, they will become the biggest winner in National Lottery history.

The UK's top EuroMillions jackpot winner is Marion Richardson, from Gateshead, who won £16.7m on 9 April, 2004, two months after the game was launched.

The largest UK National Lottery jackpot win in history was £42m shared by three ticket holders in January, 1996.

The UK's biggest single winner revealed to date is Iris Jeffrey, from Belfast, who won £20.1m in July 2004.

Proceeds from the EuroMillions tickets, which cost £1.50 in the UK, raise money for good causes.