1 March 2019
By Elaine Murphy
elaine@TheCork.ie
A grandmother from Co Cork will be hoping to hit the jackpot and spin the Winning Streak wheel when she appears on the Winning Streak TV game show on RTÉ One this Saturday (2nd March).
Last Saturday Abina Hennessy from Togher in Cork was watching Winning Streak with her husband Patrick and when the game show took a commercial break she went to the kitchen to put on the Sunday roast for the next day’s dinner.
When she returned to the living room there was a commotion as Patrick was cheering that she had been drawn to appear on Winning Streak. As she was the first name out of the drum, Abina had completely missed it! With that the phone started ringing with people from far and wide wishing to wish her all the best on the show.
After that her own children came back to Abina’s house and they had a celebration until the early hours! Abina is looking forward to the day out with her family.
She has been married to Patrick for 47 years and the couple have six adult children and are proud grandparents to six grandchildren. All their children and grandkids will be there bar their son Mark who is participating in the All-Ireland Rings Championship final, representing Cork, and granddaughter Kelly who is boxing in the Munster championships.
Her five other children (Siobhan, Patrick Jr, Yvonne, Jason and Marguerite) and five grandchildren (Leanne, Lauren, Scott, Dylan and Jodie) will be in the audience to cheer her on. Abina has no plans as of yet for any winnings but has said that she will certainly look after the family.
The Winning Streak National Lottery game show, co-presented by Marty Whelan and Sinead Kennedy, will feature some perennial favourite games as well but also brand new games including Play or Pay, Roll for Riches, WinFall and Electric Dream – where one player will win an electric car worth €25,000.
As ever one of the lucky five players will get the chance to spin the wheel and win up to €500,000. But this series a €100,000 segment will be added to the iconic Grand Prize Wheel every show if less than that was won in the previous show, improving players chances to win a massive prize.
A brand new-look Winning Streak scratch card is available in the 5,900 National Lottery retailers all over the country, where as well as the chance to appear on the Winning Streak TV game show if you get three stars, players will also be in with a chance to win some great cash prizes up to €5,000. The odds for those who purchase a Winning Streak to win is 1 in 1.76 to win a cash or three star prize. Players can also send their scratch card stubs into the National Lottery where each week, on the show, a player will be drawn as the winner of a Luxury Cruise for two valued at €5,000.
The popular gameshow first appeared on our screens in September 1990 and since then a massive 5,975 people have taken part, winning in excess of €170 million in prizes. Winning Streak is the second longest running game show in Europe.
Nearly 30 cent in every €1 spent on Winning Streak and all National Lottery games go back to Good Causes in the areas of sport, youth, health, welfare, education, arts and heritage. In total more than €5.4 billion has been raised for Good Causes since the National Lottery was established 31 years ago. In 2018 alone, the National Lottery raised over €227 million for such good causes.