Countdown to kickoff: 2021 CFL season to start Aug. 5

Are you ready for some football?

The question posed weekly by Hank Williams Jr. to Monday Night Football viewers now can be asked of fans of the Canadian Football League.

The league’s board of governors voted unanimously Monday to go ahead with the 2021 season starting Aug. 5, giving CFL fans hope their favourite teams will be back on the field for the first time since the 2019 season ended.

Each team will play a 14-game regular season. The 108th Grey Cup game is set for Dec. 12 in Hamilton.

“This is an exciting day for Canadian football and for Canada itself,” commissioner Randy Ambrosie said in a statement on the league’s website.

“I want to thank our fans, players, coaches, and partners for their incredible support and patience as we’ve worked together towards this day. This is great news for everyone who loves our game and our country.”

The 2020 CFL campaign was wiped out by the COVID-19 pandemic and many wondered if the virus would force the cancellation of the ’21 season as well.

Instead, with vaccinations increasing across the country, COVID cases decreasing and provinces planning to reopen, the league’s governors voted Monday to proceed with a season. However, it was pushed back from its initial June start date and the season was shortened from its usual 18 games per team.

The CFL initially said it would only go ahead with a season if it got the necessary approvals from governments for its return-to-play plans and for allowing a significant number of fans to attend games. Those apparently are forthcoming.

“We are on track to receive all of the necessary health and safety approvals, thanks to our tireless medical advisers and staff, and the dedicated government officials who have been working with them,” Ambrosie said in the statement. “And while the outlook for fans in the stands varies from province to province, we are confident that process is also on the right track.”

Saskatchewan Premier Scott Moe issued a statement after the league made its announcement, saying it was great news. He then implored people in the province to make sure attendance is possible.

“Will we have fans in the stands in Mosaic Stadium? Yes, if enough of us get vaccinated,” Moe said. “Let’s each do our part to reach our target of 70 per cent of all eligible residents getting their first shot in order to remove all limits on gathering sizes.”

Saskatchewan Roughriders president-CEO Craig Reynolds also issued a statement in which he urged people to get vaccinated. He also said the club would have answers to fans’ questions in the coming days and weeks.

“We are so thrilled that you are finally going to get to see the Green and White at Mosaic Stadium,” Reynolds wrote. “It is going to be unlike any other season the team has ever played in, but after falling just short of a Grey Cup berth in 2019, we feel like we have some unfinished business to attend to.

“In just a few weeks our players will arrive in Saskatchewan, and after a quarantine and testing period, training camp will begin. So too will our quest to be Grey Cup Champions.”

During a recent visit to the Green Zone with Jamie Nye and Drew Remenda, Reynolds said the governors had selected the Aug. 5 date thinking it would be attainable.

“I just feel really optimistic,” Reynolds said at the time. “It was a realistic date, we felt, when we picked it and it’s turning out to be a very real possibility.”

So, barring a resurgence of the virus in the next month, training camps should start in July 10 — and the 2021 season would start exactly 620 days after the Winnipeg Blue Bombers won the Grey Cup title on Nov. 24, 2019. The schedule and teams’ ticketing plans are to be released Tuesday.

Reynolds admitted during his chat with Nye and Remenda that the Roughriders weren’t sure how comfortable fans would be when they returned to Mosaic Stadium for the first time post-COVID. But at least they now know they’ll likely have that opportunity.

“Sitting next to someone at a Rider game and high-fiving them after a big play, that probably will take some time,” Reynolds said. “The good news is, we have until August, so I think there’s going to be a gradual coming out of this pandemic — at least here in Saskatchewan.”

The Roughriders’ goal is to get Saskatchewan people back together after nearly a year and a half of COVID-related limitations.

“We have a uniting focus and a pride focus,” Reynolds said. “I really think that’s the theme and that’s how we’re going to approach this year. We want to reunite the province.

“We’ve been apart for so long and, in my mind, nothing sort of defines Saskatchewan like coming together at Mosaic Stadium on a beautiful summer night and enjoying watching CFL football and watching the Riders.”

The governors also approved a new collective bargaining agreement with the CFL Players’ Association.