FOR ten years Ron Travers' wife had nagged him that he would never win the Daily Echo's Find the Ball competition.

With just a £10 prize to show for a decade of faithfully filling out the forms, you have to say she might have had a point.

But all that changed the moment the Hampshire dad picked up the telephone to find he had pocketed the whopping £50,000 jackpot in last week's competition.

Stunned Ron, 47, was practically speechless when he heard about the windfall.

"Brilliant," was all he could say for a few minutes until the news had sunk in.

Then he added: "I do the Find the Ball as much as I can. It's a good competition and it's local which I like. I just can't believe it. Especially considering all I've won in ten years before now is a tenner."

Wife Janet, 41, a part-time filing clerk, said: "I've been nagging Ron for years saying he'd never win it. It's just as well he never listened."

Now the family's home in Merrieleas Drive, Chandler's Ford, will receive the makeover they have wanted to give it since Ron, an office clerk, started playing Find the Ball.

Ron said: "I think the house is going to get a really big makeover. We've been thinking about having a conservatory done so this might help. We watch a lot of those reality TV shows like Changing Rooms."

Also on the cards is a trip to magical Egypt.

The family has been longing to return to the land of the Pharaohs after visiting it on a short trip from Cyprus.

Janet said: "We'd love to go back there and do it properly because of the temples and pyramids and the history in general."

Daughter Rebecca, 11, who usually helps Ron with his football competition entries, said that although she was still adjusting to the news she was well ahead with thinking about how it could be spent.

The Toynbee School pupil said: "It doesn't seem real at the moment. It's just like someone will pinch me in a moment and I'll wake up."

"I've been writing a wish list as it's my birthday on December 23 so maybe I'll get more things on it than I thought."