Xtra, the first launch from High Wycombe-based publisher Xtra Publishing Company, will be distributed through 16,000 pubs and bars across the country from mid-October.

Student unions and sports clubs will also stock the tabloid paper, which will come out every Thursday, while some 200,000 copies will be sold through newsagents.

Advertisement sales director Jeff Twiggs, a former Mirror Group Newspapers commercial boss, said that MCP had been chosen because it was "the best".

He said: "It's simple. They've been producing national newspapers with high-quality reproduction for many years, and have the best print network that I know of. Why wouldn't I choose them?"

It is as yet unclear which MCP site will print the paper. Twiggs said that he would like production to be at all three MCP plants, in Watford, Oldham and Cardonald, but added: "That's up to MCP and we know that they're all good print sites."

Twiggs said that the paper will have a pagination of between 64pp and 96pp, "depending on market conditions", with around 50% colour content.

Xtra will include a 20pp sports section along with showbiz news and lifestyle features to widen its appeal beyond its core target of 18-34 year-old men.

A spokesman for Trinity Mirror, the press group which owns MCP, said: "We are very excited about working with this new partner."

MCP's three print sites also print a number of daily newspaper titles including the Daily Mirror and the Independent.

Story by Josh Brooks