Meet this Sunday League Squad With Nearly Two Thousand English Top Division Games
How can you boost a outstanding veteran team that have claimed consecutive championships, featuring a league-cup double boasting 30 wins from 32 games?
Bring in a raft of ex- professionals who have performed at the top tier of club football and global football as you aim for further trophies.
A Greater Manchester side boasts an amateur veterans squad with nine ex- Premier League players in their active squad.
Two Hundred Twenty-Two Top Division Goals, 325 International Appearances
The team Veterans Over-35s are based in southern the city and compete in the Cheshire Vets Division Top Tier.
The lineup this campaign features 9 ex- Premier League players, with a collective over 1,800 elite appearances.
This elite squad also boasts over 220 top division scores and over 320 international appearances.
The squad include Papiss Cisse, who notched thirty-seven goals in over 100 appearances for his former club after joining them for £9m from German league club SC Freiburg in 2012.
Cisse had his debut for the team in their most recent home game against reigning champions Collegiate Old Boys and scored every one of the six goals in a six-two victory - including a half-hour first-half hat-trick.
Wythenshawe's roster for this season also includes ex- pros such as English and Liverpool striker Emile Heskey, Hull City and Burnley FC winger George Boyd, Toffees striker Oumar Niasse, Wigan full-back Maynor Figueroa, Manchester City duo Stephen Ireland and Nedum Onuoha and top-flight championship victors Joleon Lescott and Danny Drinkwater.
Together, the ex- top-flight players have won 15 major trophies and moved for total transfer fees of approximately £123m.
Famous Names and International Stars
Stephen Ireland began playing for the team in pre-season this season through good mate and current team player Blake Norton, and the former Republic of Ireland midfielder then invited additional ex-pros, who all compete in a weekly small-sided match, to join in.
Former Senegal forward Niasse, who scored twelve scores in sixty-five Premier League games for the Toffees and still attends their matches at Goodison Park, also made his first appearance against Collegiate OB - who are based in Liverpool and wear an Everton warm-up gear as their strip.
"My mate Stephen Ireland said 'join and have a game, it's good fun'," said the striker.
"Then he informed me we were facing a team from Liverpool and the surprise I had when I noticed them sporting Blue shirts - I thought this is wrong for me!
"If you still love the game and you know you can still do it, wherever you can kick a ball, what are you going to choose?
"The people who turn up and see are pleased and to make a day if they see us playing there and to pose us queries - it's more like the pleasure of us having a place we can enjoy football, with organisation of course."
Such is the strength in depth at the club, Niasse made his debut at defender.
"It's a little different but then, I enjoy running and just move forward - I'm not defending that much," he said.
"I tell my centre-back 'I'm not staying' and that I'm just going to continue running.
"That movement is what I'm after. It's good fun."
Dreamlike' Feeling
Along with Cisse's 6 goals on debut, Ireland has scored eight in 3 appearances for the side, while Boyd scored five on his first appearance and Joleon Lescott, a centre-half by position, notched a triple in one game as a striker.
The team are leading of the Top Tier with 3 victories from three and a goal difference of +19.
Paul Barrow, thirty-eight, who plays on the flank for Collegiate OB, came up against ex- Latics defender Figueroa on Sunday - and had to tell his nine-year-old boy who Heskey was.
He has appeared at 2 global tournaments for Honduras, in addition to featuring in over 200 Premier League games.
"The news was spreading like wildfire they had these ex-Premier League stars," said the player.
"I felt I was a bit awestruck playing against Figueroa to be honest.
"Even Emile [Heskey] got on and he's has over 60 English appearances.
"We held our own for a good 20 mins but then we had a player dismissed and it was tough.
"Our group really have not ceased talking about it - I was phoning my mother and sibling on the way home.
"They were all really nice, shaking our hands after the match - it was like playing a group of normal fellas.
"Now we can't wait for the return fixture."
'We'll Still Take the League'
The manager coaches the Collegiate vets side, who won the Premier Division championship the previous campaign, along with his co-manager.
"We went 1-0 ahead and had a