From April to October, Pulkit Khare will spend about four and a half hours in traffic on the weekends driving to Van Nuys and back to his home in Rancho Santa Margarita.
The ardent cricket fan, who plays in the Southern California Cricket Association league, has to do the drive on the 405 Freeway to fields in the San Fernando Valley because of the lack of facilities in Orange County.
But that might change.
Earlier this month, Irvine’s City Council unanimously agreed to move forward, once again, with negotiations with American Cricket Enterprises (which runs Major League Cricket) to find a suitable location within Great Park for a 5,000-7,000-seat stadium.
The stadium was not included in the first phase of the Great Park development plans, and it follows a similar decision from the council last year which ultimately yielded no results.
It boils down to finding the right space, said Mayor Farrah Khan, whether it’s a standalone facility or a renovation of the existing Great Park soccer stadium, which can seat 5,000 people, to accommodate both sports.
“There’s definitely a growing community of cricket players and enthusiasts in Irvine and OC,” Khan said. “My hope is that we can somehow support that enthusiasm for the sport.”
The cricket body has asked for about 15 acres of land within Great Park to privately fund a stadium that would be the first of its kind in Southern California.
The stadium would be used for both major and minor league games but mostly for community events, including local cricket and non-cricket activities, said Selby Sturzenegger, director of corporate development and infrastructure at Major League Cricket.
Major League Cricket, a professional league for the shorter Twenty20 format of the sport, has already raised more than $100 million of committed capital, Sturzenegger said.
“I got goosebumps, that’s how excited I am,” Khare said about the prospect of a full-fledged cricket stadium in Orange County.
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