Most British bookmakers will offer you the opportunity to place a bet on the Irish Lottery but in the past the poor exchange rate between the euro and the pound put punters off.

While the figures on offer looked impressive in euro terms they lost much of their dazzling shine which converted to sterling.

Now though all that has changed with one euro getting you an unprecedented high of 80p.

Tonight the Irish lottery jackpot will break the 14 million euro mark for the second time in a year. That means if the winning ticket is bought on this side of the Irish Sea then the lucky winner would pocket £11.23 million.

At National Lottery headquarters in Dublin a press officer said they expect 2-5,000 people a minute to buy tickets between 5pm and 7.45pm today ahead of the 11-rollover draw.

The jackpot last hit €14m on 12 March, when a syndicate of two from County Kildare collected €14,543,033.

On 28 July last year a family from County Cork won the largest jackpot in the 20-year history of the Lotto, scooping €16,185,749 in a draw that also followed 11 rollovers.

Also more tempting than ever for British residents is the Euro millions Lottery draw.

On Friday almost £11 million is up for grabs though when you take roll overs into account this could greatly increase before it’s eventually won.

The last Euro Millions jackpot was a whopping £46,291,408.

It’s small change though when compared to the amount won by Irish lady Delores McNamara when she amazingly scooped the equivalent of £77 million in the summer of 2005 after spending just 2 euro on her ticket.

At the time the exchange rate was approximately 67p to one euro so if she won the jackpot today she would have received the sterling equivalent of £92.5 million.