Meet the Weekend Division Squad With 1,800 Top-Flight Games
What do you enhance a excellent veteran team that have claimed back-to-back titles, featuring a double triumph with 30 wins from thirty-two games?
Recruit a raft of ex- professionals who have played at the elite tier of club football and global soccer as you target further silverware.
One Manchester side fields an amateur veterans team with nine former Premier League players in their active lineup.
Two Hundred Twenty-Two Premier League Goals, 325 Global Appearances
The team Vets Over-35s are located in southern the city and compete in the Cheshire-based Veterans League Premier Division.
The roster this campaign boasts 9 former Premier League players, with a collective over 1,800 top-flight matches.
This star-studded roster also boasts over 220 top division scores and 325 international appearances.
The squad include Papiss Cisse, who notched thirty-seven goals in over 100 games for his former club after signing for them for £9m from Bundesliga club Freiburg in January 2012.
He made his first appearance for Wythenshawe in their last home game versus defending title holders their rivals and scored every one of the six scores in a 6-2 victory - featuring a half-hour opening period hat-trick.
Wythenshawe's team for this campaign also includes ex- professionals such as English and Liverpool forward Emile Heskey, Hull City and Burnley midfielder George Boyd, Everton striker Oumar Niasse, Wigan defender Maynor Figueroa, Manchester City duo Stephen Ireland and Nedum Onuoha and Premier League title winners Joleon Lescott and Danny Drinkwater.
Together, the former top-flight footballers have secured 15 significant trophies and transferred for total transfer fees of approximately £123 million.
Famous Figures and Global Players
Stephen Ireland started turning out for the side in pre-season this summer through good mate and present team player Blake Norton, and the ex- Irish player then invited other former professionals, who all compete in a midweek small-sided match, to participate.
Former Senegal forward Oumar Niasse, who netted 12 scores in 65 Premier League matches for the Toffees and even now goes to their home games, also made his debut versus Collegiate OB - who are located in the city and use an Everton training kit as their strip.
"A friend Stephen said 'come and play, it's good fun'," commented the striker.
"Then he informed me we were facing a team from the city and the surprise I had when I noticed them wearing Everton kits - I say this is strange for me!
"If you still enjoy the game and you know you can still play, wherever you can play, what are you going to choose?
"Those fans who turn up and see are pleased and to give a day if they watch us playing there and to ask us queries - it's more like the joy of us having somewhere we can play, with structure of course."
Such is the bench strength at Wythenshawe, he made his debut at full-back.
"That's a bit unusual but then, I love sprinting and just go inside - I'm not defending that much," he added.
"I warn my centre-back 'I'm not staying' and that I'm just going to keep running.
"That movement is what I'm seeking. It's enjoyable."
Unreal Experience
In addition to Cisse's six scores on his first game, Stephen Ireland has netted 8 in 3 games for Wythenshawe, while Boyd scored 5 on his debut appearance and Lescott, a centre-half by position, scored a triple in one game as a striker.
Wythenshawe are top of the Top Tier with 3 victories from three and a GD of plus nineteen.
Paul Barrow, thirty-eight, who plays on the wing for Collegiate OB, came up against ex- Wigan defender Maynor Figueroa on Sunday - and had to tell his young son who Heskey was.
He has appeared at 2 global tournaments for Honduras, in as well as playing in over two hundred Premier League games.
"The news was spreading like wildfire they had these former top-flight stars," said Barrow.
"I think I was a little awestruck facing him to be honest.
"Even Emile [Heskey] got on and he's got over 60 English appearances.
"We held our own for a solid 20 minutes but then we had a man dismissed and it was tough.
"We literally have not ceased chatting about it - I was calling my mother and brother on the way home.
"They were all dead sound, shaking our hands after the game - it was like facing a bunch of regular guys.
"Now we can't wait for the second fixture."
'We'll Still Win the League'
Andy Kirby coaches the Collegiate veterans side, who secured the Premier Division championship last season, together with his co-manager.
"We scored one-nil up and had a