New Football Pools

Before the UK National Lottery was launched in November 1994, the only way to win £1,000,000 or more was by playing the football pools. The pools declined in popularity once the lottery captured the imagination of the public, but now the New Football Pools are back to try and reclaim the ground they lost.

For those of you who never played the football pools, the aim was to select eight matches from 49 that would result as score draws (1-1 or 2-2, as opposed to 0-0, which is a no-score draw). If you managed that, you’d win the jackpot or – if there were several winners – a share thereof. The New Football Pools “Classic Pools” game works in the same way, with the top prize each week weighing in at £3 million.

As well as the Classic Pools game the New Football Pools offers several other games, most notably Footy 15 and Premier 10. In both cases the aim is to win the top prize by predicting the outcome of either 15 or 10 stated football matches in terms of whether they will result as a home win, away win or draw.

Although few lottery players are likely to abandon their lottery dreams to pursue the New Football Pools, I expect that quite a few will be happy to play the pools alongside the Lotto. The main advantage of the pools is that there is an element of skill involved in selecting the matches most likely to result as score draws, and this will undoubtedly appeal to players who have a basic knowledge of or interest in football as a sport.

Of course, lottery games often boast jackpots that are much bigger than £3 million, and I think it is the prospect of winning such lottery riches will encourage people to continue playing games like the Lotto, EuroMillions and the Thunderball on a regular basis.

What will be interesting to see is whether the National Lottery ever comes up with a skill-based game of its own to compete directly with the New Football Pools. Personally I have my doubts about that, but it’s always interesting to speculate.

Article Last Updated: 26/08/2008 09:28:01

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