DESPITE living more than 10,000 miles from his team, a lifelong Saints fan has come up with a unique offer in a bid to get a seat for this weekend's play-offs.

Ex-pat Matt Pearce has already paid out more than £1,000 to get a flight back to the UK for this Saturday's match against Derby and Tuesday night's away leg, but as yet he's missing one vital part of his dream trip - tickets for the games.

Now the 28-year-old has made an offer he hopes someone will find hard to resist Give him your tickets for the sell-out games and in return he will let you stay at his two-bedroom beachfront home in Melbourne for up to a month.

He is also offering to give the lucky winner a guided tour of his new home city, where he bought the house a year ago after meeting his Australian girlfriend Rachel, 24.

Matt said he had been forced into the unusual ticket offer because by the time he touches down in the UK at 5.30am on Saturday morning, the game will already be sold out.

By yesterday afternoon 20,000 tickets had already gone.

He said: "I've not been to St Mary's since Saints were in the Premiership.

"If I can watch them get back into the Premiership it will be awesome.

"People are putting it down as the biggest since the 1976 FA Cup final. I've got to be there."

Matt, an assistant manager at a Melbourne gym, said he got his dad to play the radio commentary of Sunday's gripping final game of the season down the phone so he could hear the action. After the match he was straight on the phone to get airline tickets.

Matt, who grew up in Totton, will also be travelling to Wembley to watch his home team play in the FA Vase final.

He said: "It's going to be a huge weekend. It's probably on the same level as Saints getting to the play-offs. Both will be massive games. How could I not come home for it?"