Global Sports Ventures Chair Jignesh Pandya announced "plans to build as many as eight cricket stadiums" across the U.S. at an estimated cost of $2.4B to "professionalise the game in the country," according to the PTI. The Indian-American "cricket enthusiast" said that "the eight proposed stadiums, each having a capacity of 26,000," in New York, New Jersey, Washington, D.C., Georgia, Florida, Texas, Illinois and California, "would create as many as 17,800 new jobs" in the U.S. Gujarat-born Pandya is a real estate developer in the U.S. and "had been travelling across the globe with his two sons to watch popular" int'l cricket matches. Pandya: "At most of these venues, me and my sons found the audience mostly from either India or the United States. So there is a great market and ready-made audience for cricket in the U.S." He added that all of the cricket stadiums in the U.S. "would be part of what he described as lifestyle centres" which would comprise high-rise residential complexes, shopping centers, entertainment centers and office complexes (PTI, 2/2).
