Mark your calendars, Riders fans. We now have a date for when rivalry football will return to the prairies.
In lieu of preseason games, Jamie Nye reported on Thursday that a speculated joint practice and scrimmage between the Saskatchewan Roughriders and Winnipeg Blue Bombers has now been scheduled and fan information is forthcoming.
“Are you ready for some football? Riders, Bombers will have a controlled scrimmage July 24th at Mosaic Stadium. They’ll announce how to get tickets soon as you won’t be able to just show up. It’ll be the closest thing the teams will get to a preseason game before August,” Nye tweeted.
“Sounds as though Riders picking up the cost of having Bombers travel to and from Regina that day. It’ll largely be an evaluation of younger players before the final week of training camps for both teams. And if it’s anything like Hard Knocks…. things could get physical.”
Regina is just over a six-hour drive from the Manitoba capital as current public health conditions would make it easier to operate the sessions in Saskatchewan. Later in July would be an ideal timeline after both teams have had enough of their own practices to feel comfortable competing against another team.
Training camps are scheduled to begin on July 10 across the league and each team will be allowed to have 100 players at camp. Winnipeg will hold their training camp at IG Field and the Riders plan to do the same at Mosaic Stadium. CFL teams won’t play pre-season games prior to kicking off the regular season August 5.
Saskatchewan’s prairie rival visits Mosaic Stadium for the Labour Day classic on Sunday, September 5 with the Banjo Bowl slated for Saturday, September 11 in Winnipeg. The Bombers open the entire schedule hosting the Hamilton Tiger-Cats while the Riders play one day later, Friday, August 6 at home versus the B.C. Lions.
