Discover the Weekend Division Squad Boasting 1,800 Premier League Appearances
How can you improve a outstanding experienced side that have won consecutive championships, featuring a double triumph boasting 30 victories from thirty-two matches?
Recruit a group of ex- professionals who have performed at the highest tier of club football and international football as you target further honors.
A Greater Manchester side fields an amateur vets team with 9 ex- Premier League footballers in their current roster.
222 Premier League Scores, 325 Global Appearances
The team Veterans Over-35s are located in south Manchester and play in the Cheshire-based Veterans League Top Division.
The lineup this campaign features nine former Premier League footballers, with a total nearly 1,800 top-flight games.
The elite squad also includes 222 top division goals and over 320 global appearances.
They feature one forward, who notched 37 goals in 117 games for Newcastle United after signing for them for nine million pounds from German league side SC Freiburg in January 2012.
He made his first appearance for Wythenshawe in their most recent home match against defending champions Collegiate Old Boys and netted every one of the six goals in a six-two victory - including a 32-minute opening period triple.
The team for this campaign also features former professionals such as England and Anfield forward Emile Heskey, Hull and Burnley FC midfielder George Boyd, Toffees forward Oumar Niasse, Wigan Athletic defender Maynor Figueroa, Manchester City pair Stephen Ireland and Nedum Onuoha and Premier League title winners Joleon Lescott and Danny Drinkwater.
Together, the ex- Premier League footballers have secured fifteen significant honors and transferred for combined transfer sums of about £123m.
Well-Known Names and International Players
Stephen Ireland began playing for the side in preseason this season through close friend and current Wythenshawe teammate Blake Norton, and the former Irish midfielder then invited other former professionals, who all play in a midweek small-sided match, to join in.
Ex- Senegal striker Niasse, who netted twelve scores in sixty-five top-flight matches for Everton and even now goes to their home games, also had his debut against the opposition - who are based in the city and use an Everton warm-up gear as their strip.
"A friend Stephen said 'join and have a game, it's a laugh'," said Niasse.
"After that he informed me we were playing a side from the city and the shock I had when I saw them sporting Everton shirts - I say this is wrong for me!
"When you still enjoy the game and you know you can still play, wherever you can play, what are you going to choose?
"The people who come and watch are happy and to give someone's day if they see us playing there and to ask us questions - it's really about the pleasure of us having somewhere we can play, with structure of course."
So great is the strength in depth at the club, he made his first game at defender.
"That's a little unusual but then, I love sprinting and just move inside - I'm not defending that much," he said.
"I warn my defender 'I'm not staying' and that I'm just going to keep attacking.
"That movement is what I'm looking for. It's enjoyable."
Dreamlike' Scenario
Along with Cisse's six scores on his first game, Ireland has netted eight in 3 games for the side, while Boyd scored 5 on his first match and Lescott, a centre-half by trade, notched a triple in one match as a striker.
Wythenshawe are top of the Premier Tier with three wins from three and a goal difference of plus nineteen.
Paul Barrow, 38, who features on the wing for Collegiate OB, came up against former Latics defender Maynor Figueroa on the weekend - and had to tell his nine-year-old son who Emile Heskey was.
Figueroa has played at two global tournaments for Honduras, in as well as playing in more than two hundred Premier League games.
"It was spreading like wildfire they had all these former top-flight players," remarked the player.
"I felt I was a bit starstruck facing Figueroa to be honest.
"Even Heskey got on and he's got 60-odd English appearances.
"Our side held our own for a good 20 mins but then we had a player sent off and it was tough.
"We literally have not ceased talking about it - I was phoning my mum and sibling on the way home.
"The opponents were all friendly, shaking our hands after the game - it was like playing a group of normal guys.
"Now we are eager for the second fixture."
'We'll Still Take the League'
The manager manages the opposition vets team, who won the Premier Tier championship the previous campaign, together with his co-manager.
"Our team went 1-0 up and had a