Meet this Weekend League Squad With Over 1,800 Top-Flight Appearances
How can you improve a excellent veteran team that have won back-to-back championships, featuring a double triumph with 30 victories from thirty-two games?
Sign a group of ex- pro players who have performed at the top level of club and international soccer as you pursue additional honors.
A Greater Manchester team fields an non-professional veterans squad with nine former Premier League footballers in their current roster.
222 Top Division Goals, Three Hundred Twenty-Five International Appearances
Wythenshawe Vets Over-35s are based in south Manchester and compete in the Cheshire Vets League Top Division.
The squad list this season boasts 9 ex- top-flight footballers, with a combined over 1,800 elite games.
The star-studded team also includes 222 top division goals and over 320 global caps.
The squad feature Papiss Cisse, who notched 37 goals in 117 games for Newcastle United after moving to them for £9m from German league club Freiburg in January 2012.
Cisse had his first appearance for the team in their most recent home game versus reigning champions Collegiate Old Boys and scored every one of the six goals in a six-two victory - featuring a 32-minute opening period triple.
Wythenshawe's roster for this season also features former pros such as England and Anfield forward Emile Heskey, Hull City and Burnley winger George Boyd, Toffees striker Oumar Niasse, Wigan Athletic full-back Maynor Figueroa, 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 claimed fifteen major trophies and transferred for combined transfer fees of approximately £123m.
Famous Figures and International Stars
Ireland started turning out for the team in preseason this season through good friend and current team player Blake Norton, and the former Irish player then asked other ex-pros, who all play in a midweek small-sided game, to participate.
Ex- Senegal striker Oumar Niasse, who scored 12 goals in sixty-five Premier League games for Everton and still attends their matches at Goodison Park, also made his debut versus the opposition - who are located in Liverpool and wear an Blue warm-up gear as their uniform.
"A mate Stephen said 'come and play, it's good fun'," commented Niasse.
"Then he told me we were facing a team from the city and the surprise I had when I noticed them wearing Blue shirts - I thought this is wrong for me!
"If you still enjoy football and you know you can still play, anywhere you can play, what are you going to do?
"The spectators who come and see are happy and to make someone's day if they watch us competing there and to ask us queries - it's really about the pleasure of us getting a place we can enjoy football, with organisation of course."
Such is the squad depth at the club, Niasse had his first game at defender.
"That's a little unusual but then, I love running and just go forward - I'm not defending that much," he added.
"I warn my defender 'I'm not staying' and that I'm just going to keep running.
"That movement is what I'm looking for. It's enjoyable."
Dreamlike' Experience
In addition to Cisse's 6 goals on his first game, Stephen Ireland has netted 8 in three games for the side, while George Boyd scored 5 on his first appearance and Joleon Lescott, a centre-half by position, notched a triple in one match as a striker.
Wythenshawe are leading of the Premier Division with three victories from three and a GD of plus nineteen.
One opponent, thirty-eight, who features on the wing for the opposition, came up against former Latics defender Maynor Figueroa on the weekend - and had to tell his nine-year-old son who Heskey was.
He has played at 2 global tournaments for his country, in as well as featuring in over two hundred top-flight matches.
"The news was spreading like wildfire they had all these former top-flight players," said the player.
"I felt I was a little awestruck playing against Figueroa to be honest.
"Even Heskey got on and he's got 60-odd English appearances.
"Our side competed well for a good 20 minutes but then we had a player dismissed and it was hard.
"Our group literally haven't ceased chatting about it - I was calling my mum and brother on the journey home.
"The opponents were all really nice, shaking our hands after the game - it was like playing a bunch of regular guys.
"Now we are eager for the return match."
We Will Still Take the League'
Andy Kirby coaches the Collegiate vets side, who secured the Top Division title last season, together with Paul Maguire.
"We went one-nil ahead and had a