Discover this Weekend Division Club Boasting Nearly Two Thousand Top-Flight Appearances
How can you enhance a excellent experienced team that have claimed back-to-back championships, featuring a league-cup double with thirty victories from 32 matches?
Sign a group of ex- pro players who have performed at the highest level of club football and global soccer as you target further honors.
One Manchester club boasts an amateur veterans team with 9 former top-flight footballers in their current lineup.
222 Premier League Scores, 325 Global Caps
Wythenshawe Veterans Over-35s are situated in south Manchester and play in the Cheshire-based Vets League Top Tier.
The roster this campaign features 9 ex- top-flight players, with a combined 1,801 top-flight appearances.
The high-profile team also includes 222 top division goals and over 320 international caps.
The squad include one forward, who netted 37 goals in 117 appearances for Newcastle United after moving to them for £9m from Bundesliga side Freiburg in January 2012.
Cisse had his debut for Wythenshawe in their last home match against defending title holders Collegiate Old Boys and scored all six scores in a six-two victory - featuring a 32-minute opening period triple.
The team for this season also features ex- professionals such as English and Liverpool striker Emile Heskey, Hull and Burnley winger George Boyd, Toffees striker Oumar Niasse, Wigan Athletic full-back Maynor Figueroa, Manchester City pair Stephen Ireland and Nedum Onuoha and top-flight title victors Joleon Lescott and Danny Drinkwater.
Collectively, the ex- top-flight players have won 15 major trophies and moved for combined transfer sums of about £123 million.
Household Figures and International Players
Stephen Ireland began playing for the side in pre-season this season through good friend and present team teammate Blake Norton, and the former Republic of Ireland midfielder then invited additional ex-pros, who all compete in a midweek small-sided match, to participate.
Former Senegal forward Oumar Niasse, who netted 12 goals in 65 top-flight matches for Everton and still goes to their matches at Goodison Park, also had his first appearance versus Collegiate OB - who are located in Liverpool and wear an Everton training kit as their uniform.
"A mate Stephen Ireland said 'come and play, it's good fun'," commented the striker.
"Then he told me we were playing a team from Liverpool and the shock I had when I saw them sporting Blue shirts - I thought this is wrong for me!
"When you still love football and you feel you can still do it, wherever you can play, what are you going to choose?
"The fans who come and see are happy and to make someone's day if they see us playing there and to ask us queries - it's really about the pleasure of us getting somewhere we can enjoy football, with structure of course."
So great is the squad depth at the club, he made his debut at defender.
"It's a bit different but then, I enjoy running and just move inside - I'm not defending that much," he said.
"I tell my defender 'I'm not staying' and that I'm just going to keep attacking.
"That movement is what I'm seeking. It's enjoyable."
Dreamlike' Scenario
In addition to Cisse's six scores on his first game, Ireland has netted 8 in three games for Wythenshawe, while George Boyd hit 5 on his first match and Lescott, a centre-half by trade, scored a triple in one match up front.
The team are leading of the Premier Tier with 3 victories from 3 and a goal difference of plus nineteen.
Paul Barrow, thirty-eight, who features on the flank for the opposition, came up against former Latics defender Figueroa on Sunday - and had to tell his young boy who Heskey was.
Figueroa has played at two World Cups for Honduras, in addition to playing in over 200 top-flight games.
"The news was spreading like wildfire they had all these former top-flight stars," remarked Barrow.
"I think I was a little awestruck playing against Figueroa to be honest.
"Also Heskey came on and he's has over 60 England caps.
"Our side held our own for a solid twenty minutes but then we had a player sent off and it was tough.
"Our group really have not stopped chatting about it - I was phoning my mum and sibling on the journey home.
"The opponents were all really nice, shaking our hands after the match - it was like facing a bunch of regular guys.
"Now we can't wait for the second fixture."
'We'll Still Win the Title'
Andy Kirby coaches the opposition vets side, who secured the Top Tier title the previous campaign, together with his co-manager.
"Our team scored one-nil up and had a