Nat Coombs

Nathaniel 'Nat' Coombs is a British television & radio presenter & writer.

Education

Coombs was educated at the boys' independent school Dulwich College in Dulwich, South London, and at University College London.^{[citation needed]}

Sports television and radio

Coombs is primarily a sports presenter, and mainly works for ESPN, Channel 4 & the BBC. For ESPN he is one of the UK's main live studio hosts, and has presented the live studio football show Talk of the Terrace in its various formats, as well as being the regular anchor for the channel's live Bundesliga studio coverage. Coombs often interviews players and provides features for other ESPN football output and has presented ESPN's coverage of the 2012 and 2013 World Darts Championships.

As well as his work for ESPN, Coombs is known as one of the leading US Sports broadcasters in the UK. He currently hosts NFL Live on Channel 4 alongside Mike Carlson and he has presented both live NFL and MLB coverage (including the World Series) on BBC Radio.^[1]

In 2013 he began appearing regularly on the commercial UK Sports Radio station TalkSport as both a presenter and guest.

Between 2007-10 he presented Channel 5's live NFL American Football coverage, again with Carlson broadcasting all Sunday Night Football and some Monday Night Football games. In 2010 he also co-presented NFL: UK, a weekly magazine show, also on Channel 5 that was shown on Saturday mornings, alongside Trevor Nelson and Natalie Pinkham.

Coombs & Carlson are also part of the Americarnage podcast which they co-host, along with comedian Dan Louw. The show has nominated twice in the Podcast Awards (2011 & 2013) under the "Best Sports" category and has been featured on the frontpage of iTunes. It has charted as high as Number 3 in the iTunes UK Sports download charts.

He has worked on many television shows as a talking head or panelist. He regularly appears on Radio 5 Live, TalkSport and ESPN in this capacity.

Acting

Prior to becoming established as a sports presenter, Coombs was an accomplished actor & comedian, most notably appearing in the BAFTA-nominated BBC drama Can You Hear Me Thinking? alongside Judi Dench.^{[citation needed]} Early in his career, he appeared in music promos for bands including 808 State & Everything But The Girl and advertising campaigns for Doctor Martens, Levi Strauss and Microsoft.^{[citation needed]} as well as television commercials for a variety of brands including Borsodi.

Comedy

He began his career as a stand up comedian, performing at leading venues across the UK and appearing regularly on radio and TV.^{[citation needed]} He was a semi-finalist at the BBC New Comedy Awards and a runner-up of Stand-up Britain on ITV. He was also a Regional Finalist of the Jongleurs J20 competition and a Semi Finalist in both the Amused Moose & Laughing Horse New Act competitions. Early in his career appeared on the BBC Radio comedy program 'Spanking New' alongside comedians including Rhod Gilbert and Shappi Khorsandi which featured live performances from some of the UK's best new comedy talent.

His stand up work has been variously described as “incredibly stylish, with up-to-the-minute stuff” by John Pidgeon and “like the Strokes beating the s*** out of Westlife in a car park” in Time Out magazine, though he received criticism for an overly "Americanised" style ^{[citation needed]}. In June 2006, he took part in the Just for Pitching competition at the Just For Laughs comedy festival in Montreal, where journalist Tamsen Tillson from Variety magazine described him as "setting tongues wagging" ^{[citation needed]}.

Writing

Coombs regularly writes or contributes US sports content to the UK print & online media including the British website of ESPN ^[2] and has his own column on the ESPN America website.

He also writes Tea With Tony La Russa, an independent blog which focuses on American sports & culture from a British perspective.

Coombs created the innovative digital comedy show Chelsey OMG^[3] which he wrote and co-produced. The first series of the show, based on his character Chelsey Pucks, which originally appeared on Radio 1 comedy sketch show The Milk Run, debuted on the online social networking site Bebo^[4] and was watched by over 3 million people.^{[citation needed]} It also drew critical acclaim for its interactive format, whereby the characters interact with the shows fans. Coombs appears in the show as Jens, a German fashion photographer.

Personal life

Coombs has followed the National Football League since he was a child and is a fan of the Miami Dolphins.^{[citation needed]} He is a fan of the English football team West Ham United who he watches regularly and is the top ranked celebrity fan of ESPN's Five Time Award Winning "Fantasy Focus: Football 06010" daily podcast, hosted by Nate Ravitz and Matthew Berry. Coombs makes an annual appearance on the podcast, usually during the week of which an NFL game will be played in Britain. He's married and lives in London ^{[citation needed]}.

References

External links

• Vivienne Clore Talent Agency
• Nat Coombs Official Website
• Stardoll to launch video channel with comedy series New Media Age 4 June 2009
• Nat Coombs Group Facebook
• Nat Coombs Twitter
• Tea With Tony La Russa (blog)