Andy Devaney
The Laureus World Sports Awards have always liked a bit of sparkle, but this year they are arriving in Madrid with the sort of double act that makes even seasoned sports fans sit up a little straighter. Novak Djokovic and Eileen Gu will co-host the 2026 ceremony at the Palacio de Cibeles on Monday, April 20, marking the first time two active sporting heavyweights have shared the job on what is widely regarded as the grandest night in global sport.
That is not a minor tweak to the running order. It is a statement.
For years, the Laureus World Sports Awards have traded on prestige, polish and peer recognition. Hollywood has done the presenting, famous faces have done the smiling, and the sporting elite have turned up in black tie looking faintly uncomfortable until the envelopes start opening. But this time the show is placing two athletes at the centre of it all, which feels rather fitting for an event that has long called itself the Athletes’ Awards.
A stage built for champions
Djokovic and Gu are not simply decorative additions to the bill. Between them, they bring enough silverware to sink a banquet table.
Djokovic is a record-equalling five-time Laureus World Sportsman of the Year, an Olympic gold medallist and owner of 24 men’s Grand Slam singles titles, which is an absurd sentence however many times you read it. Gu, meanwhile, has become one of the defining winter sports athletes of her age, a multiple Olympic and world champion, the 2023 Laureus World Action Sportsperson of the Year and a Laureus Ambassador.
This pairing gives the evening a little more sporting muscle and a little less stage-managed gloss. That matters. The Laureus World Sports Awards do not work because they are shiny. They work because the room is full of people who know exactly what greatness looks like, how hard it is to sustain, and what it costs.
Why Laureus still carries weight
In a sporting world drowning in ceremonies, branding exercises and back-patting industry dinners, the Laureus World Sports Awards have managed to keep something rare: credibility.
The winners are chosen by the Laureus World Sports Academy, a group of 69 sporting legends whose achievements stretch across generations and disciplines. That voting structure is the point of the whole enterprise. These awards are not handed out by marketing departments, social media trends or public whim. They are judged by people who have lived the grind, handled the pressure and stared down the sort of moments that turn knees to steam.
That is why a Laureus carries a little extra heft. It is not just a trophy. It is approval from the people who know.
Across categories such as Sportsman and Sportswoman of the Year, Team of the Year, Breakthrough of the Year and Comeback of the Year, the ceremony has become a kind of annual roll call for excellence, resilience and competitive bloody-mindedness.
Madrid gets the big night
There are worse places to throw sport’s finest party than Madrid.
The Palacio de Cibeles, with its grand bones and civic swagger, provides a suitably imposing backdrop for an event that likes to think of itself as the Oscars of sport, only with better hamstrings and fewer acceptance speeches thanking agents. The ceremony will once again bring together names from sport, entertainment and culture, and with a global broadcast audience in the millions, the Laureus World Sports Awards remain one of the few events capable of making athletes from entirely different worlds feel like part of the same conversation.
It also tends to generate the kind of social media traffic that modern sport now feeds on, as winners are revealed and those charming, slightly awkward, entirely human encounters between elite competitors play out in real time.
From Hollywood hosts to a sporting first
The Laureus World Sports Awards have never been shy about celebrity. Previous hosts have included Bill Murray, Andy Garcia, Samuel L Jackson and Benedict Cumberbatch. In 2025, Lindsey Vonn became the first athlete to host the ceremony, nudging the event in a more sport-led direction.
Now that idea has been pushed further.
By handing the stage to Djokovic and Gu together, Laureus is leaning into its own identity rather than borrowing someone else’s. It no longer needs Hollywood to translate excellence for the audience. It can let excellence speak for itself.
Djokovic on what Laureus means
Djokovic said: “The Laureus World Sports Awards hold a special place in my heart. They celebrate not just excellence in sport, but the power of sport to make a difference. I have been honoured with five Laureus statuettes over the years. It is always a unique opportunity to mix with athletes from other sports – and meet the sporting heroes who make up the Laureus World Sports Academy.
Last year, I was privileged to present Mondo Duplantis with his Laureus World Sportsman of the Year Award – and this time I am delighted to be hosting the show with Eileen, a remarkable athlete who also understands the purpose and mission of Laureus.”
Gu on joining him in Madrid
Eileen Gu said: “The Laureus World Sports Awards are incredibly special to athletes, because they celebrate our achievements in a way nothing else does – through the respect and understanding of our peers, while inspiring millions of young sports fans all over the world.
They really are the Athletes’ Awards and winning a Laureus in 2023 was a milestone moment in my career. I was thrilled to return last year to present the Laureus Sport for Good Award to Kick4Life and the Lifetime Achievement Award to Kelly Slater. To now be part of the show as a host, alongside Novak – someone whose journey and accomplishments I’ve admired for so long – is a real honour.”
More than a ceremony
What makes the Laureus World Sports Awards compelling is not merely the red carpet or the famous faces. It is the sense that, for one evening, sport pauses long enough to look itself in the mirror.
It honours the obvious things, of course: medals, titles, records, comebacks. But it also nods toward something bigger — influence, durability, inspiration and the capacity of sport to cut through noise in a fractured world.
Djokovic and Gu are suitable hosts for that message. One is a veteran whose greatness has been measured in decades, the other a modern phenomenon whose appeal crosses generations, disciplines and continents. Together, they give this year’s ceremony a balance of gravitas and freshness that the occasion deserves.
And that, in the end, is why the Laureus World Sports Awards still matter. In a culture forever chasing the next thing, they remain a rare place where achievement is not inflated, sponsored into submission or dressed up as something it isn’t. It is simply recognised — by the very best in the business.
