It's been a long 18 months but finally, full tackle football is back at the AD Penner Park grid-iron.

Gavin Don, president of the Eastman Raiders, couldn’t be more pleased.

“It is very exciting." Don says, “we weren’t sure what the season would look like a couple of weeks ago, but now we are going ahead with a proper tackle season. Though the season itself will be a bit shorter than normal.”

When it comes to registrations for the 2021 MMFA Tackle Football Season, he says, earlier this summer they were asking players to pre-register to try and gauge what the interest would be for a Raider football season, but now that they are able to play organized games, Don is hoping registrations will increase so that they can form teams with a squad of at least 9 players per team per age group.

He says, “We still need players to complete the teams, but I'm hoping that a lot of people didn't pre-register because they weren't entirely sure what was going to happen.” Now that Football Manitoba has given the green light to games beginning the weekend of September 11th, Don hopes that more players will register.

Registration is open to anyone born between 2008 and 2013. They are also welcoming players born in 2006 and 2007 to pre-register if they are not able to play for a high school JV team.

MMFA will be running a 7-week program. Eastman Raiders practices will be taking place on Tuesday and Thursday nights in Steinbach.

There are also volunteer positions open for coaches, trainers and team managers.

When asked why this was important to him, Don says,

“For me. It's about getting kids out. It's about getting them out on the field and getting them playing football.”

Click the link to register for Eastman Raiders Football. All home games will be played at the AD Penner Park Football field.