IF good luck really comes in threes, it might be worth heading for the Clifton Bingo Club and grabbing a seat around this table - if you are lucky enough to find one of them empty.

A 71-year-old woman from Whixley, sat there and ended up scooping an £18,000 prize. The following night, another player, a 77-year-old woman from Knaresborough, sat there and scooped the national jackpot of £101,000.

Club manager Mick Lacy is certainly hoping for a hat-trick of success.

He said: "All good things come in threes, so we will probably have another big winner very soon. I expect there will be a rush to sit in those lucky seats now."

Whether anyone will be able to oust either of the happy winners from the coveted table is another matter. The Whixley winner plays at Clifton three times a week and is always to be found at the seats around the table, numbers 189-192.

The Knaresborough winner is often there on other evenings.

Mr Lacy said that club members had also enjoyed success sitting in other seats - with six people winning prizes of more than £2,000 over the last year or so.

Opinion is divided among regular Clifton punters on whether a certain seat can really help you win, with one saying he purposefully chooses a different seat each time he visits.

Alan Bell, 76, from Burton Stone Lane, York, said he was not superstitious, but admitted that he and his wife, Viv, 61, had a favourite table.

He said: "I always sit in the same place. You can't save seats, but people know I sit here. But no, I'm not superstitious."

Bingo caller Andy Pettitt said: "I think I am a little more philosophical than to trust to luck. But if people think it's lucky, it's lucky.

"I will say that there is always someone sat in those chairs.

"The more people sit there, the luckier they become!"

Can a seat bring you luck? We asked players at Clifton Bingo Club

Alan Bell, 76, of Burton Stone Lane, said: "I always sit in the same place. You can't save seats, but people know we sit here."

Joyce McGuinness, of Haxby, said: "I prefer the bottom numbers, but it is a case of just being in the right place at the right time."

Brenda McMillan of Boroughbridge Road, York, said: "At the end of the day you've got to have the right ticket, to be honest."

Sharon Hayden, 36, Tockwith: "I won £2,000 last night. We sit all over. No special chair."

Viv Bell, 61, of Burton Stone Lane, York, said: "Anybody sits in this chair, but you get used to sitting in a certain place."

Another player, who wished to be known only as Dickie, of Clifton, York, said: "it's where you are in the queue for the tickets that counts."

Updated: 10:33 Wednesday, February 02, 2005