The crisis caused by the COVID-19 pandemic has influenced many (economic) activities. Sports and sports events are one of the most affected activities - the inability to accurately assess the emergence of future events and frequent changes to the conditions, rules and regulations lead to uncertainty, significantly aggravating event organisation and execution possibilities. Operational and strategic uncertainty has urged sports- and other establishments involved in sports events to conduct prompt analyses and adjustments to sports event organisation, reducing negative influences on desired benefits. Questioning the aim and scope of sports event organisers’ adaptation to uncertain work conditions, and the impact of uncertain conditions on achieving sports events’ desired socio-economic benefits, the research aims to display the types of operationalised transformation to sports events while facing uncertain work conditions and highlight examples of achieving the best results. The analysis of relevant academic and sector reports found that the sports industry faced high losses in future values of projections before the emergence of a crisis caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. Sports event organisers attempted to transform sports events and associated products and services by incorporating digital, eSports or virtual reality elements to various degrees. The annulation of negative impacts had short-term mixed results. Still, the selfless sharing of knowledge led to a faster-than-projected industry recovery. The industry benefited on multiple levels, developing possibilities through virtualisation and gamification of (pro)sports events, media content diversification, enhancing fan engagement in commercial activities, and establishing new collaboration models amongst industry stakeholders.