Introduce the Weekend Division Squad With Nearly Two Thousand Premier League Appearances
How can you boost a outstanding veteran side who have secured consecutive championships, featuring a league-cup double with thirty wins from 32 matches?
Recruit a collection of former pro players that have performed at the highest level of club football and international soccer as you pursue more honors.
A Manchester club boasts an non-professional veterans squad with 9 ex- top-flight footballers in their current squad.
Two Hundred Twenty-Two Top Division Goals, Three Hundred Twenty-Five Global Caps
The team Vets Over-35s are situated in south Manchester and compete in the Cheshire-based Vets Division Premier Tier.
The squad list this season features nine former Premier League footballers, with a collective 1,801 top-flight appearances.
This elite roster also contains over 220 top division goals and over 320 international caps.
They include Papiss Cisse, who scored 37 scores in 117 games for Newcastle United after joining them for £9m from German league side SC Freiburg in January 2012.
He made his first appearance for Wythenshawe in their last home-field game against reigning title holders their rivals and netted all six scores in a 6-2 victory - featuring a 32-minute opening period hat-trick.
The team for this season also includes former professionals such as English and Anfield forward Emile Heskey, Hull City and Burnley FC midfielder George Boyd, Everton forward Oumar Niasse, Wigan full-back Maynor Figueroa, Manchester City duo Stephen Ireland and Nedum Onuoha and top-flight championship winners Joleon Lescott and Danny Drinkwater.
In total, the ex- Premier League players have secured fifteen significant trophies and transferred for total transfer fees of approximately £123 million.
Well-Known Figures and International Players
Stephen Ireland began turning out for the team during preseason this season through good friend and current team teammate Blake Norton, and the ex- Irish player then invited additional ex-pros, who all play in a weekly small-sided match, to join in.
Former Senegalese striker Niasse, who netted 12 scores in sixty-five top-flight games for Everton and still goes to their matches at Goodison Park, also had his first appearance versus the opposition - who are based in Liverpool and use an Everton training kit as their strip.
"A mate Stephen Ireland said 'come and play, it's enjoyable'," said the striker.
"After that he informed me we were facing a side from Liverpool and the surprise I had when I noticed them sporting Blue shirts - I say this is wrong for me!
"If you still enjoy football and you feel you can still play, anywhere you can kick a ball, what are you going to choose?
"The fans who come and watch are pleased and to give someone's moment if they watch us competing there and to pose us questions - it's more like the pleasure of us having somewhere we can enjoy football, with structure of course."
So great is the squad depth at the club, Niasse had his debut at defender.
"That's a bit unusual but then, I enjoy sprinting and just move forward - I'm not defending that much," he added.
"I tell my defender 'I'm not hanging back' and that I'm just going to continue running.
"That running is what I'm looking for. It's enjoyable."
'Surreal Experience
In addition to the forward's 6 goals on his first game, Stephen Ireland has netted 8 in 3 appearances for Wythenshawe, while George Boyd hit 5 on his debut appearance and Lescott, a defender by position, notched a triple in one game up front.
Wythenshawe are top of the Top Tier with 3 wins from 3 and a goal difference of +19.
Paul Barrow, 38, who plays on the wing for the opposition, came up against ex- Latics full-back Figueroa on the weekend - and had to tell his young son who Heskey was.
He has appeared at 2 World Cups for his country, in as well as featuring in over two hundred Premier League matches.
"The news was spreading like wildfire they had all these ex-Premier League stars," said the player.
"I think I was a little starstruck playing against Figueroa to be honest.
"Even Heskey came on and he's got over 60 England appearances.
"Our side held our own for a good twenty minutes but then we had a player dismissed and it was hard.
"Our group literally have not ceased chatting about it - I was phoning my mother and brother on the way home.
"The opponents were all dead sound, shaking our hands after the game - it was like facing a group of normal fellas.
"Now we can't wait for the second fixture."
'We'll Still Take the Title'
Andy Kirby coaches the Collegiate vets side, who won the Top Tier title the previous campaign, together with his co-manager.
"Our team scored one-nil ahead and had a