Paddy McGuinness is to return to comedy acting.

The Take Me Out presenter has been cast in ITV's new sitcom, The Delivery Man.

The six part series focuses on a policeman called Matthew who becomes disillusioned with his job so quits to becomes a male midwife on a busy maternity ward.

As previously reported, Spy star Darren Boyd takes on the lead role of Matthew, with Cold Feet's Fay Ripley as Caitlin, the tough senior midwife.

It was revealed today that McGuinness has been cast in the role of Ian, the best mate of Darren Boyd's character.

The Delivery Man is now in production, and also features Aisling Bea (Trollied), Alex Macqueen (Hunderby) and Llewella Gideon (Ab Fab).

Much of the production team behind The Delivery Man previously worked on the hit comedy drama Green Wing. This new sitcom is written by Rob Harley and James Henry and produced by Victoria Pile.

Paddy McGuinness rose to fame via Phoenix Nights, the Channel 4 sitcom created by his friend Peter Kay. His and Kay's bouncer characters went on to star in their own spin-off in 2004, Max & Paddy's Road To Nowhere.

McGuinness is perhaps now better known as a presenter, and he currently fronts the dating show Take Me Out. His most recent acting role was in one-off 2013 comedy drama The Security Men.

Fans of Phoenix Nights are currently hoping for a cast reunion. At the weekend Peter Kay announced at a charity Q&A session: "I am going to be making a big announcement about Phoenix Nights sometime in the next 10 days so fans need to be watching out for that."

The Delivery Man will air 2015, sitting on ITV alongside its returning comedies Benidorm, Birds Of A Feather and Vicious.