Strictly's Josh Widdicombe says he's battling extreme fatigue and feeling 'not very well' after his first week as new host

Josh Widdicombe has revealed he is suffering from 'stomach problems' as he admitted the first week of Strictly has left him 'so tired'. 

The comedian, 43, is making his debut as one of the new Strictly hosts alongside Emma Willis and Johannes Radebe during the launch show on Saturday. 

And the star admitted he has never been 'so tired in my life' as he opened up on feeling the strain after filming. 

Chatting with fellow comedian Rob Beckett on their podcast Parenting Hell, Josh admitted: 'I'm not very well. I don't want to go too graphic, but I've got stomach problems. 

'I just keep needing a p***, and I'm constipated, and I've got stomach pains. I have a UTI I think, or something. I am just f****d.' 

He added: 'I'm not stressed, I'm tired. Full disclosure, we've done the launch show of Strictly on Wednesday. 

'It went well. The next day, I don't think I've ever been so tired in my life and I still don't feel like I've fully recovered.

'Admittedly, I had a show in Dublin the next day, then I came back and then I had a full-on weekend of parenting.'

He added: 'I think my autumn is going to be more full on than I anticipated.'  

On Saturday viewers will see him, Emma and Johannes make their hosting debut when the Strictly Come Dancing launch show airs.

They were unveiled as the presenting trio in May after Tess Daly and Claudia Winkleman stepped down in December.

However, there are no 'like-for-like' swaps in terms of their duties.

Speaking alongside her co-hosts, Emma told Richard Osman on his The Rest Is Entertainment podcast last week: 'There's no like-for-like, so no one's kind of replacing anybody, and at the minute it's all very kind of open.

'We're having lots of production days where we go in and we play around and we're kind of feeling each other out – well, they're feeling us out really.'

Josh jokingly compared their situation to the idea of 'total football', which is a style of play where players can rotate in and out of each other's positions.

He quipped: 'It's going to be like total football, Richard. We're going to be moving everywhere.'

Emma also clarified that Johannes 'definitely' won't be in a 'backstage roving reporter' role as some insiders previously suggested.

The trio said they were itching to get started with the show after being put through their paces during a gruelling four-month audition process. 

Explaining it was all very 'cloak and dagger' and 'a bit like Traitors', Josh even revealed that Strictly bosses invented a fake gardening show to keep the audition process secret. 

'We were told if the driver asked, he'd been told it was a show about gardening called The Great Garden Glow Up,' Josh said. 

Emma added: 'So they created a whole new name for a show. Created a whole new show… They said for the cab drivers.'  

'I did feel like saying to my agent, "I wouldn't have gone to The Great Garden Glow Up chemistry test,"' laughed Josh. 'I am in the back of the car and there is a cabbie who is judging me. Because he thinks I would present a show called The Great Garden Glow Up.'

After auditioning separately, the trio were asked to return for chemistry tests. Stars like Zoe Ball and Sara Cox have revealed they were part of the secret auditions but didn't bag the roles and the trio confirmed they did indeed have chemistry tests with a number of different potential hosts.

Later on in the week, the trio were finally united, but have admitted that even producers weren't sure on how the live show format would work with three.

Emma said bosses told them during their callback 'this is the last one and this is a wild card'.

'We're just like, "What happens if we do three?" And they said, "It's so much of a wild card, we don't really have a script for you either. So we're going to sit down, get it up on the screen and we'll have a little tinker all together."' 

Josh admitted he was shocked when Johannes walked in the room, explaining that 'you've seen the papers. So you presume those are the people in the mix. And so you think "oh it's probably one of these people". And then Jojo walked in.

'I'd say both of us thought that's a weird combo.'

'There was a moment of that wasn't it?' Johannes agreed. 'We were like what is going on here? Because we didn't know that the three of us were going to end up in the room.'

Two weeks later and the three finally got the call confirming they were the hosts. 

It wasn't all sequins and glam though as Emma confessed she took the Zoom call whilst sitting on the toilet at the hairdressers whilst Josh was 'in a graveyard in Birmingham'.