The USSR had already known lotteries by that time, but now people buying such a ticket were able to win money not at random but through their single-handed selection of a combination of figures. Meant to raise money for the construction of stadiums and distract risky citizens from vodka and Solzhenitsyn, Sportloto occupied Soviet people’s minds for several years. The minds of creative intellectuals were captured too – just remember Gaidai with his Sportloto-82 or Vysotsky with a threat from Kanatchikova dacha inhabitants. However, there were not that many enthusiastic people: satirists even called Sportloto an accurate way to count optimists. After all, mathematicians have calculated that the chance to guess 6 numbers out of 49 may be enjoyed by one out of 13,983,816 people who have bought a Sportloto ticket. The likelihood of winning in other lotteries is not significantly higher.