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Riders' "flannel-free facility": funny trolling, hopefully not a serious policy

Riders' "flannel-free facility": funny trolling, hopefully not a serious policy

After starting the season 0-3, the Saskatchewan Roughriders are hoping to turn things around against the Ottawa Redblacks Friday night, and they're perhaps targeting even a bigger home-field advantage than normal. Redblacks' fans are known for wearing flannel shirts in red-and-black plaid, so that explains this addition to the usual Mosiac Stadium signage that the Riders' Twitter account posted:

This is pretty good as far as CFL trolling goes, and it's certainly a step up from efforts such as the Eskimos' 2014 "horrible human beings" ads and at least on par with the various billboard wars we've seen over the years. Let's hope it's not something the team actually tries to enforce, though; opposing fans should always be welcome at CFL games in whatever apparel they want to wear. Also, if anyone cracked down on that, it would hurt the Roughriders more than anyone else, as they tend to have the largest away fan presence throughout the league). So, this is solid trolling, but it shouldn't be a policy (and hopefully it won't be; the Riders' tweet makes it seem like this is just a joke). It could be a dangerous policy, too; flannel is a Canadian symbol, not just a Redblacks' one, and we don't want to see any anti-#hoserism efforts here.

This does add to what's become a pretty good rivalry between Saskatchewan and Ottawa, and quite an impressive one considering that the Redblacks have only been in existence for a few years. Of course, there's plenty of CFL history beyond that in Ottawa, with the Rough Riders (1876-1996) and Renegades (2002-2006) both dueling with Saskatchewan over the years. Moreover, there are reasons for Ottawa fans to dislike Saskatchewan, as the Roughriders reportedly nixed any Ottawa return to the Rough Riders name, and there have been arguments over hashtags (Ottawa's #RNation is considered by some Saskatchewan fans to be too close to their #RiderNation). The flannel-free facility will only add to that. It would be great if Saskatchewan had continued with the 70s Night theme they're doing and let Ottawa use "Rough Riders" for one night, though.