£6.75M Euro Lotto Winner
21 Nov 2006

A pub landlord who scooped £6.75million on the lottery told last night how his dying grandad predicted he would land a fortune.

Dean Hardman and his partner Stella Kelsall had one of the seven British tickets which won a share of last week's £123mil-lion EuroMillions jackpot.

Now, the 32-year-old plans to buy a racehorse and name it after his grandad Stanley Rigby who died of cancer last October, aged 78.

Bury fan Dean said: "It's funny because my grandfather always said I would come into money one day. It's one of the last things he said to me before he died.

"I want to buy a racehorse. I love racing and so did he so I'd like to do that for him."

Dean and Stella, 37, also plan to fly Down Under to watch England's cricket stars try to hold on to the Ashes against bitter rivals Australia.

He said: "It starts on Thursday so that might be a bit too soon, but I would love to get there at some point." Dean, who runs the Crown Inn in Heywood, Gtr Manchester, with Stella, told how he was sitting in the pub last Friday when he realised they had won a fortune.

He said: "I was enjoying a normal night in the bar playing dominoes with friends.

"Someone turned the TV over to the lottery and I took the ticket out to check.

"The first number came out and I had it. Then they just kept coming, when the last number was coming I was shouting at the TV for number 32. I couldn't believe it when it came up. Stella took the ticket to check on the internet and I just finished my pint." On the Saturday after the draw, Dean and Stella, who has three children aged 20, 19 and 15, had a party to celebrate.

Football mad Dean, who also works for a door making firm, plans to buy a box at his beloved League Two side Bury's Gigg Lane ground where he was presented with his winner's cheque.

But Stella, his partner of four years, said they plan to stay at the Crown. She added: "It is a nice pub with good customers."

A 33-strong syndicate of workers at Palethorpes pie factory in Market Drayton, Shrops - which is under threat of closure - also won a £6.75million share of the Euro jackpot. They each get more than £200,000.

Two UK jackpots have yet to be claimed. The winners had to have the five main draw numbers 12, 22, 32, 33, 36, plus one of two lucky star numbers two or six.

France had four of the 20 winning I tickets, Portugal and Spain each had I three, Spain two and Ireland one.

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