Former England manager Steve McClaren failed in a high court bid over the weekend to prevent the Sun publishing a front-page story about an alleged extramarital affair.

McClaren unsuccessfully applied for an 11th-hour privacy injunction to prevent the publication of the story in the Sunday edition of the Sun, headed "Soccer exclusive: McClaren affair with Sven's ex".

The high court threw out McClaren's legal bid after an emergency one-hour hearing by telephone on Saturday evening.

Mr Justice Lindblom, the high court judge considering the application, ruled that the public interest in the story being published outweighed McClaren's right to privacy.

David Dinsmore, the interim managing editor of the Sun, described the ruling as "an important victory in what is becoming an increasingly difficult world".

The story alleged that McClaren had an extramarital affair with Saima Ansari, who previously claimed to have had a relationship with his predecessor as England manager, Sven-Goran Eriksson.

The high court ruling comes after an extraordinary period for privacy injunctions in 2011, when the high court granted numerous gagging orders to sports stars and people in the entertainment industry.

It is understood that McClaren's role as ex-England manager was a significant factor in the high court decision. The Sun had argued that the job is the most high-profile public position in the country.

The high court has previously ruled against ex-England football captains when they took action against newspapers over stories on their alleged extramarital affairs.

Rio Ferdinand last year lost his privacy action against the Sunday Mirror over a "kiss and tell" story. In 2010, the high court threw out John Terry's attempt to prevent reporting of his alleged affair with an ex-girlfriend of his former Chelsea teammate, Wayne Bridge.

The media lawyer Mark Stephens described the ruling as a "strong judicial swing towards free speech and away from privacy where there are matters of public interest".

Sarah Webb, the media lawyer and partner at Payne Hicks Beach solicitors, said the McClaren judgment was unsurprising given the Ferdinand ruling in 2011.

She added: "It does not signal a swing towards freedom of speech, the law remains that there must be a balance between privacy and freedom of speech, however it does confirm that those who live their lives in the public eye will find it more difficult to keep their misdemeanours out of the press."

McClaren hired media law specialists Schillings in a bid to halt the story. The Sun was represented by Richard Spearman QC and the solicitor Louis Charalambous, from the law firm Simons Muirhead & Burton.

The Sun withheld the story from early editions of Sunday's paper. Instead, the paper led on an exclusive final interview with Winnie Johnson, the mother of Ian Brady murder victim Keith Bennett. Johnson died on Saturday after a long battle with cancer.

The Sun changed its front page to headline "Soccer exclusive: McClaren affair with Sven's ex" for later editions, but it is not known if this was directly related to the high court ruling.

Previously, the Sun has withheld exclusive stories from early editions to trump the competition and prevent rival papers from publishing follow-ups.

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