Josh Denzel: Chasing His Dream in Sports Presenting
The newest Prevayl Pro, sports presenter Josh Denzel spent a day at Prevayl HQ to train in the Prevayl Performance Lab and get to know the Prevayl products. We caught up with Josh after his workout to discuss his self-started, unconventional journey to becoming one of the UK’s leading presenters and his plans for the future.
It wasn’t always ringside with Anthony Joshua or on the red carpet with Will Smith for Josh; he started his media journey in a nine-to-five office job in recruitment. Unlike most presenters who start their career working in TV as runners or studying journalism at University, Josh decided to teach himself. He began presenting from Arsenal games on Snapchat to a small following, which rapidly grew and was eventually spotted by LADbible, who invited him to work for them… and the rest is history!
Now, the Arsenal season ticket holder has spent the last three years building relationships with the England football team, hosting The Lions' Den for Euro 2020, fronting JD Sports’ pay-per-view fights with Anthony Joshua and, most recently, Soccer Aid.
Josh has been a Soccer Aid mega fan since day one – May 2006, to be precise. He remembers fondly when it was first presented by Ant and Dec.
“I was sitting down in my living room, my dad had a curry, and I was like, ‘What the hell is this?”
Nearly 15 years later, Josh was part of the England camp and covered the event.
“It was incredible, I felt like I was at the Champions League final. The atmosphere was insane. I’ve got to give a big shout out to some of the celebs: Tom Grennan, he was fantastic; Chunkz; Aitch. All these guys can play, so for them to get the opportunity to showcase their skills against top pros is amazing.”
But, what the event actually stands for isn’t lost on him.
“I’ll do whatever I can to help raise the profile of UNICEF and put more eyeballs on Soccer Aid. Although the game itself is important, the charity is much more important.
“It’s mad to think that over the course of a week, we raised over £13M for such a good cause.”
One of the novelties of Soccer Aid has always been the mix of personalities who come on board: musicians, actors, athletes, TV personalities. Josh would not only be open to playing himself, but he would positively jump at the chance.
“I’d love to play Soccer Aid, having been there and experienced it as a fan over the years and then to cover the event within the camp this year... It definitely got my toes tingling, I was ready to come on if they needed me at a moment’s notice.”
So, what’s next for the sports presenting powerhouse? Well, Josh has big plans for the future, he wants to host his own late-night show!
“I would love to do a late-night show, have real, honest, open and funny conversations with people who inspire me. I love shows like The Cube, so maybe I’ll get a little challenge element in there to bring out the competitive streak in people.”
If you think that’s ambitious, think again. Josh wants to do a presenting masterclass too.
“It’s something that I’ve wanted to do for a long time. I always get people messaging me and asking ‘How did you get to where you are? How do you do what you do?”
Josh takes great pride in the fact that he is a self-made presenter, however, he has received many pearls of wisdom from the likes of David Haye, Anthony Joshua and Derek Chisora along the way and he wants to share his knowledge and experience with aspiring presenters.
“I would have loved to have something like this in place for when I was starting out because I winged it. I’ve made mistakes that I probably wouldn’t have made if I’d had some guidance.
“It’s a less scary mountain to climb when you’ve got a guide leading the way.”