MSC Cruises, the Geneva based cruise shipping company, is reported to be considering a return to the UK after a break next year and to have a 137,000 gross ton Fantasia class ship based in Southampton by 2017.

“Speaking to Travel Weekly at the CLIA Selling Cruise Conference in Southampton after the cruise line announced an order for two new ships, Giles Hawke, executive director of MSC Cruises, said he believes a Fantasia-class ship will sail out of the UK in three years' time,” the Travel Weekly reported in a daily newsletter.

The company will not have a ship in the UK in 2015 as the current Southampton based MSC Opera is one of the four smaller ships of the company that will be lengthened next year.

MSC Cruises yesterday unveiled an order for two 154,000 gross ton ships at Fincantieri, two months after it had opted for two 167,000 gross ton ships to be built at STX France.

Hawke said: "It's exciting news. Globally we are the third biggest cruise line in the world and these new ships widen our strength. We will have 16 ships and the smallest will have more than 2,000 passengers. There is a real opportunity for the UK to grow and in 2017 the aim is that we will have a Fantasia-class ship ex-UK, and that's an exciting prospect," he was quoted as saying.

But Hawke stressed that current efforts were focused on growing UK sales for Mediterranean fly-cruises after the line announced it would not have a ship based in Southampton next year.