Mayor of London pledges to bring more international sports events to the city

Sadiq Khan (pictured above) says he aims to bring WrestleMania, Superbowl and NBA to London and put together another winning bid for the Olympics in 2040. 

As he campaigns for re-election, the Mayor of London announced a ‘new boost’ into grassroots sport and underrepresented communities via City Hall’s £20 million Go! London fund.

Mr Khan says he would plan to ‘fully cement London’s reputation as the undisputed sports capital of the world’ by pledging to bid for more ‘high-profile’ events in the city if he came out on top during the mayoral election. 

This would include establishing a ‘taskforce’ to ‘explore’ bringing more sports from North America and around the world to London, including the first international WrestleMania.

The Mayor’s pledge comes mere weeks after WWE President Nick Khan announced that WWE had decided to keep the company’s five biggest premium live events, including WrestleMania, in North America for the foreseeable future.  

However WWE are aiming to hold all of their other pay-per-views internationally including the upcoming Clash at the Castle event taking place at the SSE Hydro in Glasgow.

WrestleMania in London had been teased prior to the completion of the WWE-UFC merger in September 2023, including by John Cena at last year’s Money in the Bank. 

Khan’s team says that last year’s event, which was held in Los Angeles, had a $215 million economic impact for the wider area, and the combined impact of the 2016 to 2023 events was $1.2 billion.

 In his manifesto, Mr Khan has also committed to exploring a bid for another London Olympics and Paralympics in 2040, and to campaigning to bring the NBA – the US’s National Basketball Association – to the capital.

In addition, he has pledged to ‘encourage’ more Londoners from ‘under-served communities’ to participate in sport through the Go! London fund, which was launched last year. The scheme awards grants of up to £40,000 to community groups for young people. and as much as £150,000 for organisations to scale up projects for ‘underserved young Londoners’ through sport.

Mr Khan has also promised today to restore the Crystal Palace National Sports Centre ‘to its former glory’ and turn it into Britain’s first zero-carbon major sports centre. This includes working with partners to deliver the restoration of Crystal Palace athletics stadium.

The area’s athletics venue has fallen into disrepair since national athletic events were moved to the new Olympic Stadium in the east of the capital in 2012.

The mayor said: “London is a world leader in major sports events and has been at the heart of some of the most memorable sporting moments of the last few decades. From the Olympics, to the Lionesses winning the Euros at Wembley, to the Ashes at Lord’s and The Oval, London is where it’s at.

If I’m re-elected on 2 May, I’m determined to go even further and fully cement London’s reputation as the undisputed sports capital of the world. I believe that London has the potential to host the first international WrestleMania.

In the meantime, my message to anyone travelling to the Paris Olympics this summer is to include a visit to London in your itinerary, to enjoy all that our city has to offer.”