Man lost £1m after filling in wrong betting slip

Student Jordan Donnellan, 19, had got 11 out of 11 matches right and was waiting for the last three results to come through on Sunday at his local pub in Consett, County Durham.

The pressure cranked up after Atletico Madrid beat Real Betis 2-0 in Seville and Stoke beat Aston Villa at Villa Park 4-1, and his final bet was for Juventus to beat Catania in the Italian top league.

A group of around 25 friends and family cheered as ex-Manchester United and Manchester City striker Carlos Tevez scored for Juve and the party went wild at the final whistle, thinking his £1 accumulator had netted him a million.

Mr Donnellan, who is applying to join the RAF, tried to stay calm and took the slip in to his local Ladbrokes where the results were checked the next day.

He says an assistant checked the results, offered him a hug and said he would have to return as the shop did not have that amount of cash on the premises and she would speak to the area manager.

But when he returned three hours later, his mistake had been spotted.

He had filled out a Weekend Result Rush - which requires both teams to score, and offers higher odds - instead of the Weekend Quickslip form he thought he had used.

The Leeds Metropolitan University student said: “I genuinely believed I was going to win £1m.

“We were jumping around and celebrating.”

Ladbrokes said the higher odds offered in the Weekend Result Rush required both teams to score - and so Mr Donnellan had a losing bet. If he had correctly filled out the Weekend Quickslip he would have won much less than £1m.

David Williams, Ladbrokes spokesman, said: “It’s rather like buying a UK lottery ticket then spotting that your numbers have come up on the Australian Lotto. You then claim that it’s what you meant to do in the first place and then expect to be paid out.

“It was a nice try but it is also nonsense.”