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MADRID: Swedish pole vaulter Armand Duplantis and American gymnast Simone Biles shared the top honors on Monday at the annual Laureus World Sport Awards ceremony in Madrid.

Double Olympic champion and world record holder Duplantis was voted Sportsman of the Year at the ceremony marking the 25th anniversary of the awards, while Biles was named Sportswoman of the Year.

Duplantis, 25, took the award ahead of tennis great Novak Djokovic, Formula One world champion Max Verstappen and French swimmer Leon Marchand.

He follows Usain Bolt as the second representative from track and field to win the award.

Biles won the award for the fourth time, equalling the record held by Serena Williams, after winning three gold medals and a silver last summer at the Paris Olympics.

“I won this award for the first time in 2017 and Laureus has been a part of my story since then,” said Biles.

“There might be a little girl watching someone like me on television and deciding she can do it, too.”

Another gymnast Rebeca Andrade won the Comeback of the Year award after winning gold in the floor at Paris while Barcelona’s Spanish prodigy Lamine Yamal, who had an exceptional first full season for club and country, winning Euro 2024 with Spain at just 17, won the Breakthrough of the Year award.

Real Madrid, who won their 15th Champions League and La Liga, took the team award.

Rafael Nadal, who retired from tennis last November at the age of 38, was given a Sports Icon award and surfer Kelly Slater a Lifetime Achievement award.

KOLKATA: Shubman Gill led from the front with his 55-ball 90 to help Gujarat Titans hammer holders Kolkata Knight Riders by 39 runs on Monday and consolidate their top spot in the IPL.
Gujarat posted 198-3 after Sai Sudharsan, who hit 52, and Gill put on 114 runs for the first wicket to lay the foundations of the total at Kolkata’s Eden Gardens.
The bowlers then combined to restrict Kolkata to 159-8 with skipper Ajinkya Rahane playing a lone hand with 50 to register Gujarat’s sixth win in eight matches.
Kolkata, who won their third title of the popular T20 tournament last year, slipped to their fifth defeat in eight matches.
The batters set up victory for Gujarat with England’s Jos Buttler hitting an unbeaten 41 off 23 balls as he steered the team after the opening stand between the Sudharsan and Gill.
“We never talk about that one of us has to stay until the end,” player-of-the-match Gill said on being asked about one of their top three staying through to the end in most of the matches.
“We just talk about how we can score runs in these conditions and how to take the game deep.”
Gill was watchful at the start but the left-handed Sudharsan hit a few boundaries to get Gujarat going after being invited to bat first.
Gill took on Moeen Ali with a six and two fours in the second spell for the former England spinner and soon reached his third half-century of the season.
The in-form Sudharsan raised his fifth 50-plus score in this edition as he went past 400 runs to nudge out Lucknow Super Giants batsman Nicholas Pooran (368) as the leading batsman.
Buttler is third with 356 runs in his eight innings.
Andre Russell handed Kolkata its first breakthrough as the pace bowler dismissed Sudharsan after his 36-ball knock but he came under attack from Buttler who hit him for three successive boundaries.
Buttler and Gill kept up the attack before fast bowler Vaibhav Arora denied the Gujarat captain his hundred.
Buttler lost another partner in Rahul Tewatia but Gujarat finished with a flourish in a 18-run 20th over from Arora.
In reply, Kolkata lost Rahmanullah Gurbaz in the first over of the chase when Mohammed Siraj got the Afghanistan wicketkeeper-batsman trapped lbw for one.
Sunil Narine, a left-hand opener, and Rahane hit back with regular boundaries in a brisk partnership of 41 until Afghanistan leg-spinner Rashid Khan broke the stand.
Rashid had Narine caught out for 17 before Rahane and Venkatesh Iyer put on another stand to keep Kolkata in the hunt.
Sai Kishore removed Iyer on 14 and fellow spinner Washington Sundar sent back Rahane stumped out after his fifty to derail the chase.
“When you are chasing 199, you expect a good opening start with the batters, that’s where we are struggling throughout this tournament,” said Rahane.
“I thought 199 chaseable on this wicket, we bowled really well, we faltered with our batting.”
Russell added some spark with a 15-ball 21 as he hit three fours and one six but Rashid picked up his second wicket to remove him thanks to a Buttler stumping.
Season’s leading bowler Prasidh Krishna then took two wickets in one over to take his count to 16.