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Neither Christmas nor Thanksgiving nor Easter nor Brendan Gillanders’ birthday happen this week, but it feels like a combination to him.

Gillanders has yet to play a regular-season game for his hometown Canadian Football League team, but he’s expected to be on the roster at running back and on special teams when the Ottawa Redblacks welcome the Montreal Alouettes to TD Place stadium on Friday night.

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“There’s no way you can simulate it,” said Gillanders, a former Gee-Gees university all-star who after two seasons with the Toronto Argonauts signed with the Redblacks as a free agent in February, but hurt a knee during training camp and has been on the injured list for the first seven games of the 2016 CFL season.

“Once you get into the game, it’s a lot more tiring. You have adrenalin running through you and you go that much harder. I have been practising, whether it has been on the scout team or on special teams, for the last couple of weeks, and I have stayed after practice to get a little bit of conditioning, so I’m trying to get as close to that game-speed ready as I can be.”