PETER Kay is to front a new £20 million advertising campaign for John Smith's bitter.

The Bolton comedian stars as the 'No-Nonsense Man' in a series of hilarious ads to be screened later this month.

The campaign, the biggest ever for the brand, will continue with the gimmick-free approach for which John Smith's has become famous.

The first ad, Ball Skills, opens on a muddy recreation ground with a group of young footballers practising their ball juggling skills.

After each demonstration, the player skilfully passes to a colleague, until it reaches Peter -- who promptly boots it into a nearby garden.

The ad ends as a pleased looking Peter chooses a can of John Smith's over the more traditional half-time oranges.

Peter, who has long joked in his stand-up routine that he enjoys a glass of Bailey's Irish Cream, said: "I am chuffed to bits to have been picked to be in these adverts.

"When they approached me I looked at the scripts and felt like they looked as though they had been written for me. I thought they were very funny indeed. I had a lot of fun filming them."

One more risque ad, in which 'No-Nonsense Man' talks about sex education, is to be shown in cinemas only.

As well as the TV commercials, Peter will see his face plastered on billboards and cardboard cutouts across the UK.

The rising star has a new series of his hit TV comedy show Phoenix Nights out in the autumn and is also due to start a three-month, 70-date, stand-up tour at about the same time. Scottish Courage has a history of hiring hot comics for its adverts. Jack Dee became famous for his John Smith's adverts in the late 90s which featured dancing penguins in a spoof on elaborate marketing gimmicks.

Dee was ditched in 1998 and instead the brewery came up with "No-Nonsense Man", a cardboard cut-out of an ordinary bloke shown downing a pint of John Smith's on a deck chair and in his local pub.

The long-running "No Nonsense" campaign began in the early 1980s, with a campaign starring Arkwright, a flat cap-wearing Northerner whose dog, Tonto, performed circus tricks in return for a drink of John Smith's.