Discover the Sunday Division Squad Featuring Over 1,800 Top-Flight Games
What do you boost a stellar veteran side who have claimed back-to-back titles, including a league-cup double with 30 victories from thirty-two games?
Sign a group of ex- pro players who have played at the highest tier of club football and global soccer as you pursue additional trophies.
A Manchester club fields an amateur veterans team with 9 former top-flight footballers in their active lineup.
Two Hundred Twenty-Two Top Division Scores, 325 International Caps
Wythenshawe Vets Over-35s are situated in southern the city and play in the Cheshire Vets League Premier Division.
Their lineup this campaign includes 9 former Premier League footballers, with a combined 1,801 Premier League matches.
The high-profile squad also includes over 220 Premier League scores and over 320 international appearances.
They include Papiss Cisse, who scored 37 goals in 117 appearances for his former club after joining them for £9m from German league club Freiburg in 2012.
He had his first appearance for Wythenshawe in their last home-field match versus reigning title holders Collegiate Old Boys and scored all six scores in a six-two victory - featuring a 32-minute opening period hat-trick.
The squad for this season also includes ex- professionals such as English and Anfield forward Emile Heskey, Hull City and Burnley winger George Boyd, Toffees striker Oumar Niasse, Wigan defender Maynor Figueroa, Manchester City pair Stephen Ireland and Nedum Onuoha and Premier League championship victors Joleon Lescott and Danny Drinkwater.
In total, the former top-flight players have won fifteen significant honors and moved for combined transfer fees of about £123 million.
Well-Known Names and International Players
Ireland started playing for the team in preseason this summer through good friend and current team player Blake Norton, and the ex- Republic of Ireland midfielder then invited additional ex-pros, who all play in a midweek small-sided game, to join in.
Former Senegal striker Niasse, who scored twelve goals in 65 top-flight games for the Toffees and even now goes to their matches at Goodison Park, also made his debut against the opposition - who are based in the city and wear an Blue warm-up gear as their uniform.
"My mate Stephen told me 'come and play, it's enjoyable'," commented the striker.
"After that he informed me we were playing a side from the city and the shock 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 do it, anywhere you can play, what are you going to choose?
"Those fans who turn up and watch are pleased and to give someone's day if they see us playing there and to ask us queries - it's more like the joy of us having somewhere we can enjoy football, with structure of course."
Such is the bench strength at Wythenshawe, he had his first game at defender.
"It's a bit unusual but then, I love sprinting and just go inside - I'm not staying back that much," he added.
"I warn my defender 'I'm not staying' and that I'm just going to keep attacking.
"That running is what I'm after. It's good fun."
Unreal Scenario
Along with Cisse's six goals on debut, Stephen Ireland has netted 8 in 3 appearances for Wythenshawe, while George Boyd hit 5 on his debut appearance and Joleon Lescott, a centre-half by trade, scored a hat-trick in one game as a striker.
The team are top of the Premier Division with three victories from 3 and a goal difference of plus nineteen.
Paul Barrow, 38, who plays on the wing for the opposition, faced ex- Wigan defender Figueroa on Sunday - and had to explain his young son who Emile Heskey was.
Figueroa has played at 2 global tournaments for Honduras, in addition to featuring in more than two hundred Premier League games.
"It was going round like wildfire they had all these ex-Premier League players," remarked the player.
"I felt I was a bit awestruck playing against him to be honest.
"Also Heskey got on and he's got 60-odd English caps.
"Our side competed well for a good twenty minutes but then we had a player dismissed and it was tough.
"We literally haven't ceased talking about it - I was calling my mother and brother on the journey home.
"They were all dead sound, shaking our hands after the game - it was like facing a group of normal guys.
"Now we can't wait for the second fixture."
We Will Still Win the League'
The manager manages the Collegiate veterans side, who secured the Top Division championship last season, together with his co-manager.
"Our team scored 1-0 ahead and had a