Introduce the Sunday Division Squad With Nearly Two Thousand Top-Flight Games
What do you improve a stellar veteran team who have claimed back-to-back titles, featuring a league-cup double with 30 wins from 32 matches?
Sign a raft of ex- professionals who have performed at the top level of club and global soccer as you target more honors.
A Manchester club fields an amateur vets squad with 9 former Premier League footballers in their active lineup.
Two Hundred Twenty-Two Premier League Scores, 325 Global Appearances
Wythenshawe Vets Over 35s are based in south the city and play in the Cheshire Veterans Division Top Division.
Their lineup this season boasts nine ex- top-flight players, with a total nearly 1,800 top-flight games.
This high-profile roster also boasts 222 top division scores and over 320 international caps.
They include Papiss Cisse, who scored thirty-seven goals in over 100 appearances for his former club after signing for them for nine million pounds from Bundesliga club Freiburg in 2012.
Cisse had his debut for Wythenshawe in their last home game versus reigning title holders their rivals and scored every one of the six goals in a 6-2 win - featuring a half-hour opening period triple.
Wythenshawe's squad for this season also includes ex- professionals such as England and Liverpool forward Emile Heskey, Hull and Burnley FC midfielder George Boyd, Toffees striker Oumar Niasse, Wigan Athletic defender Maynor Figueroa, City duo Stephen Ireland and Nedum Onuoha and Premier League title winners Joleon Lescott and Danny Drinkwater.
Collectively, the ex- Premier League footballers have secured 15 major trophies and transferred for total transfer sums of about £123 million.
Well-Known Names and International Players
Stephen Ireland started turning out for the team in preseason this summer through good friend and current team player Blake Norton, and the ex- Irish player then asked other former professionals, who all compete in a weekly nine-a-side match, to join in.
Former Senegalese striker Oumar Niasse, who scored twelve goals in 65 Premier League matches for Everton and still goes to their matches at Goodison Park, also had his debut versus the opposition - who are based in the city and use an Blue training kit as their strip.
"A mate Stephen said 'join and have a game, it's enjoyable'," commented Niasse.
"After that he told me we were playing a team from the city and the shock I had when I saw them wearing Blue shirts - I say this is wrong for me!
"When you still enjoy the game and you know you can still play, anywhere you can play, what are you going to choose?
"The people who come and watch are happy and to make someone's moment if they watch us competing there and to pose us queries - it's more like the joy of us having somewhere we can enjoy football, with organisation of course."
So great is the strength in depth at the club, Niasse made his debut at defender.
"It's a bit different but then, I enjoy sprinting and just move forward - I'm not staying back that much," he added.
"I tell my defender 'I'm not hanging back' and that I'm just going to keep running.
"The running 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 Wythenshawe, while George Boyd scored five on his first match and Lescott, a centre-half by trade, scored a hat-trick in one game up front.
Wythenshawe are leading of the Top Division with three wins from three and a goal difference of plus nineteen.
One opponent, thirty-eight, who plays on the wing for Collegiate OB, faced ex- Latics defender Maynor Figueroa on the weekend - and had to explain his young son who Emile Heskey was.
Figueroa has appeared at 2 global tournaments for Honduras, in as well as featuring in more than 200 top-flight matches.
"The news was going round like a rumor they had all these former top-flight players," said Barrow.
"I think I was a little starstruck playing against him to be honest.
"Even Emile [Heskey] came on and he's got over 60 English caps.
"Our side competed well for a solid twenty mins but then we had a man dismissed and it was hard.
"Our group literally haven't ceased chatting about it - I was phoning my mum and sibling on the way home.
"The opponents were all dead sound, shaking our hands after the match - it was like facing a group of regular guys.
"Now we are eager for the return fixture."
We Will Still Win the League'
The manager manages the Collegiate veterans team, who won the Top Tier championship the previous campaign, together with Paul Maguire.
"We scored one-nil up and had a