Former News of the World editor Colin Myler has admitted there is a touch of irony about being pitted against his former bosses Rupert and James Murdoch in his new job as editor-in-chief of the New York Daily News.

Speaking to MediaGuardian as he boarded a flight to America on Thursday, Myler described his return to the rough and tumble of New York's bitterly contested daily tabloid newspaper market as a great end to a pretty difficult year.

He added that he was looking forward to getting back to work, six months after he was left without a job with the abrupt closure of the Sunday tabloid – the UK's biggest selling paper – by the Murdochs at the height of the phone-hacking scandal in July.

He is also relishing the prospect of taking on his former boss, Rupert Murdoch, who owns the News's arch rival, the New York Daily Post – but more particularly doing battle with his son James, who is in the process of relocating to New Corporation's New York headquarters from London, where he oversaw News of the World publisher News International.

Asked how he felt about taking on the Murdochs, Myler said. "It's going to be fun ... there is a touch of irony about it."

Myler spectacularly fell out with James Murdoch following the closure of News of the World, publicly accusing him of misleading MPs during parliamentary hearings about phone hacking.

Myler and Tom Crone, the News of the World's former head of legal, allege that they told Murdoch in 2008 that phone hacking at the paper went beyond a single rogue reporter.

Murdoch, who oversees News International as News Corp's deputy chief operating officer, denies this.

Before being parachuted into News of the World in 2007, Myler was executive editor of Murdoch's New York Post for several years. So he will be familiar with the news territory when he starts his new job on 10 January – six months to the day since the final edition of the News of the World was published.

Myler's appointment was announced late on Wednesday to New York Daily News staff, but the former News of the World editor revealed that the 74-year-old owner of the paper, Mort Zuckerman, made him the offer as far back as October.

"He made the decision very easy for me. It is a great opportunity for me, it is a great paper with a great history and family reasons aside, it was easy," Myler said.

He admitted he will be sad to be apart from his two grown-up daughters in the UK, but said: "It is a great end to a pretty difficult year. It's a new chapter and I'm looking forward to working again, to be honest."

It is Myler's fourth editorship – after the Daily Mirror, Sunday Mirror and News of the World – and the appointment has already caused a stir in New York with Murdoch's Post gleefully reporting that "a new round of turmoil ripped through the Daily News yesterday as mercurial owner Mort Zuckerman handed walking papers to editor-in-chief Kevin Convey".

"Most staffers were scratching their heads about who Colin Myler is and if he would try to bring the paper more downmarket. 'I don't know anything about him other than what I read about the News of the World,' said one staffer at the Snooze."

Myler did not rule out hiring former News of the World staff, who he described as brilliant. "I tried to keep in touch with as many as I could ... they have been caught in the slipstream and it's not their fault [that the paper closed]. They will get fixed up because they are brilliant, but it's taken it's toll."

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