SOME choose to float off on the sea, some choose to be blown away from a mountain.

But when the final whistle blows for Saints' striker James Beattie, he wants his ashes scattered on the St Mary's pitch to be trampled into the ground by a generation of future players.

And if the Saints' home ground is his heavenly resting place, then Fratton Park is his hell.

"There's only one instance in which I'd choose cremation over burial, and that's if I were to spend the rest of my career playing for Southampton," says Beattie.

"If that happens then I'd like my ashes to be scattered over the pitch, so that future players would grind my remains into the turf. I quite like that idea."

The extraordinary revelations come in a frank interview with the 26-year-old star, which appeared in a national newspaper magazine at the weekend.

In it, he speaks about his Roman Catholic upbringing, confusion about his Christian faith, his close friend's death at just 24 years old - and his idea of hell.

"I don't know if I'll go to heaven, but I imagine it to be like the Grand Canyon - huge, bottomless and beautiful," he said.

"Hell would be like Fratton Park, where Southampton's local rivals, Portsmouth, play."

The footballer, who appeared in last night's Three Lions documentary on Sky One, also speaks of a car crash two years ago that profoundly changed his outlook.

"People talk about your life flashing before your eyes when you think you're going to die, but nothing like that happened to me; I didn't see a thing.

"I just remember taking my feet off the pedals because I'd heard that was what you should do. When I got out of the car, I was so scared I couldn't walk.

"Thank God I was alright. It had a profound effect on me and I've changed the way I think about a lot of things. I'm more careful now."

He wants Rudyard Kipling's If read at his funeral, his mum or dad and fellow footballer Gary Monk to say a few words, and a big party afterwards.

U2 would play in his front room, he said, and everyone would drink Remy Martin Louis XIII brandy.

"I'd like to die in my sleep, having had the chance to say goodbye to my family and friends," he added.

And if the Southampton's top scorer, local celebrity and fashion guru was to return in another life, to greater things?: "If I were to come back, I'd like it to be as a dog because they don't have to do anything but lie there, eat food and go for the odd walk."