Lotto changes reduce your chance of becoming rich

YOUR chances of hitting the jackpot and becoming rich overnight just got slimmer – one in 20 million‚ to be precise.

That is because, from July 31‚ the national lottery operator increased the number of balls from 49 to 52, a change which one number-crunching expert said has made winning tougher.

“Under the [older] system‚ there [were] 13 983 816 possible lottery tickets thus the probability of winning the jackpot [was] roughly 1 in 14 million, since only one of these tickets would match all the numbers‚” Mark Dowdeswell‚ a mathematical statistics lecturer at Wits University, said.

“If the only change is to increase from 49 to 52 balls then there are 20 358 520 possible lottery tickets and the probability of winning the jackpot is roughly 1 in 20 million.”

Not all avid punters are happy about this.

“Most countries have 49 numbers affording punters roughly one in about 12 million chances of winning the jackpot‚” Ron Ferraris said .

“By contrast, the Australian lottery’s numbers range from 1 to 45 so chances of winning the jackpot are about one in nine million.

But lottery operator Ithuba said it was not all doom and gloom.

Marketing head Khensani Mabuza said more balls would come with bigger jackpot prizes.

They have also increased the overall winning divisions to eight as opposed to the previous seven. This means players now have three chances at three jackpots for every draw.

In the US, there are 69 balls in play. Despite this‚ one woman managed to perfectly match six numbers, winning $758-million – almost R10-billion.