Hot Shots 2026: Antoine Allen

With 12 award nominations in five years, Antoine Allen is gaining widespread attention for his emotionally powerful journalism. His reports to date have included conversations with parents devastated by the loss of children to cancer and knife crime, and with sports stars including Chloe Kelly, Anthony Joshua and Mo Farah about mental health and the pressures of elite sport.

The latter laid the groundwork for Antoine’s first primetime documentary, Stronger, Faster, Younger: Britain’s Steroid Boom. He delivered the programme, for ITV’s Tonight strand, amid some personal turmoil due to a series of family emergencies.

To amplify the story, Antoine pitched an Evening Standard story in which he travelled to Abu Dhabi to secure exclusive access and interviews at the controversial Enhanced Games. The story generated millions of engagements online and put the story on the global agenda via another ITV doc, Olympics on Steroids: Inside the Enhanced Games.

Antoine’s sizeable body of journalism experience includes seven years at ITV News, including work as newsreader for Good Morning Britain, and two seasons of ITV’s On Assignment programmes and ITV Sport’s FA Cup coverage match day correspondent.

Darren Lewis, president of the Sports Journalists’ Association – which awarded Antoine the Sport for Change Journalism award in 2024 – admires the journalist’s versatility.

“Antoine is able to capture a moment, drive change on an issue or articulate how and why a particular aspect of sport needs to change,” he says. “His body of work has been consistently outstanding and is an inspiration, both to his peers and to aspiring reporters with his integrity and is single-mindedness.”