22 September 2026 · The Entrypoint team
The club lotto has carried Irish and UK club finances for decades — for some clubs it's still up to 30% of income. But committees keep telling us the same three things: ticket sales are drifting down as older sellers retire, it's a weekly operation that never gives volunteers a break, and the licensing admin is a recurring chore. If that sounds familiar, here are the genuine alternatives.
Lotteries, lotto draws and raffles are games of chance, and both jurisdictions regulate them. In Ireland, the Gaming and Lotteries Act 2019 sets out when a club lottery needs a Garda permit or court licence, with limits tied to prize values. In the UK, most club draws run as "small society lotteries" registered with the local authority. None of this is prohibitive — thousands of clubs comply — but it's real admin, and it's one reason committees look for formats that sit outside the chance-based category altogether. (This is general information, not legal advice — confirm your own club's position with the relevant authority.)
Competitions of skill are a different category. Where the outcome turns on entrants' own judgement — which football team to pick and when to pick it — you're running a skill-based competition, not a lottery. That's the category Last One Standing sits in.
Members pay one entry fee, pick a team to win each gameweek, never the same team twice; a loss or draw eliminates, last member standing takes the prize and the club keeps the rest. It shares the lotto's best quality — recurring engagement over months — without the weekly draw, ticket sellers or permit queue. Run online, admin is near zero and entries are card-paid straight to the club. Real clubs took in €3,000+ in single competitions this year. How it works →
Golf Major Picks (choose golfers across tiers, best three scores count) and GAA Championship prediction competitions run one to sixteen weeks and are also decided by entrants' judgement. Good for four bursts of fundraising a year rather than a permanent operation. The formats, explained →
Half the pot to the winner, half to the club, sellable monthly online. Be clear-eyed that it is a draw, so the licensing rules above apply just as they do to the lotto. Where it beats the lotto is simplicity: no number-picking mechanics, no rolling prize fund to manage, easy online ticketing.
A properly-run membership renewal (200 adults × €25 = €5,000/year), facility rental, and an annual event with real pulling power. None replaces the lotto alone, but stacked with a skill competition they can.
| Club lotto | Last One Standing | 50/50 draw | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Category | Chance — permit/licence needed | Skill — outside lottery regimes | Chance — permit/licence needed |
| Cadence | Weekly, forever | Seasonal bursts (months each) | Monthly |
| Volunteer load | High (sellers, draws, results) | Low (promotion only, if online) | Low-medium |
| Engagement | Habitual | High — leaderboards, eliminations, talk | Moderate |
Don't kill a working lotto. Run a Premier League Last One Standing alongside it for one season, starting in August, and compare: money raised per volunteer hour, and how many new people engaged. Most clubs find the two audiences barely overlap — the lotto keeps its regulars while the competition pulls in members, parents and emigrants the lotto never reached. Then decide with data. Compare all three formats →