Meet the Sunday League Team With Nearly Two Thousand English Top Division Matches
How do you boost a excellent experienced team that have won consecutive titles, including a league-cup double with thirty victories from thirty-two matches?
Recruit a collection of ex- pro players that have performed at the highest tier of club and global soccer as you pursue additional trophies.
One Greater Manchester side boasts an amateur vets squad with nine former Premier League footballers in their present squad.
Two Hundred Twenty-Two Premier League Goals, Three Hundred Twenty-Five International Appearances
The team Veterans Over 35s are situated in south Manchester and play in the Cheshire-based Veterans Division Top Tier.
Their squad list this season features nine former Premier League footballers, with a total 1,801 Premier League matches.
This elite team also contains 222 Premier League scores and 325 global caps.
The squad feature Papiss Cisse, who scored thirty-seven scores in over 100 games for Newcastle United after moving to them for nine million pounds from German league club Freiburg in 2012.
Cisse made his first appearance for the team in their last home match versus defending title holders Collegiate Old Boys and scored all six scores in a six-two victory - featuring a half-hour opening period hat-trick.
The team for this season also includes former professionals such as English and Anfield forward Emile Heskey, Hull and Burnley winger George Boyd, Everton forward Oumar Niasse, Wigan Athletic full-back Maynor Figueroa, City duo Stephen Ireland and Nedum Onuoha and top-flight title winners Joleon Lescott and Danny Drinkwater.
Together, the ex- top-flight players have claimed 15 major trophies and moved for total transfer fees of around ÂŁ123 million.
Household Names and International Players
Stephen Ireland started playing for the side during pre-season this summer through good friend and current Wythenshawe teammate Blake Norton, and the ex- Republic of Ireland midfielder then invited additional ex-pros, who all play in a weekly small-sided match, to join in.
Ex- Senegalese forward Niasse, who scored twelve goals in sixty-five top-flight games for the Toffees and still goes to their matches at Goodison Park, also had his debut versus Collegiate OB - who are based in the city and wear an Everton training kit as their strip.
"A friend Stephen said 'join and play, it's good fun'," commented Niasse.
"After that he informed me we were playing a side from Liverpool and the shock I had when I saw them sporting Everton shirts - I say this is wrong for me!
"When you still enjoy football and you feel you can still play, anywhere you can play, what are you going to choose?
"The fans who turn up and watch are happy and to give a moment if they see us playing there and to ask us questions - it's really about the joy of us having somewhere we can play, with structure of course."
So great is the squad depth at the club, he made his debut at full-back.
"It's a bit different but then, I love running and just move forward - I'm not defending that much," he added.
"I warn my defender 'I'm not hanging back' and that I'm just going to keep attacking.
"The movement is what I'm after. It's enjoyable."
Dreamlike' Feeling
In addition to Cisse's six goals on debut, Stephen Ireland has netted 8 in 3 appearances for the side, while George Boyd hit 5 on his debut appearance and Joleon Lescott, a centre-half by trade, notched a triple in one match up front.
The team are top of the Premier Tier with 3 wins from 3 and a GD of plus nineteen.
Paul Barrow, 38, who features on the wing for the opposition, faced ex- Latics defender Maynor Figueroa on Sunday - and had to explain his nine-year-old boy who Heskey was.
Figueroa has played at two global tournaments for Honduras, in as well as featuring in over two hundred top-flight games.
"It was spreading like wildfire they had all these former top-flight stars," said Barrow.
"I felt I was a bit awestruck facing him to be honest.
"Even Heskey came on and he's has 60-odd England appearances.
"Our side held our own for a solid 20 minutes but then we had a man sent off and it was hard.
"Our group really haven't ceased talking about it - I was calling my mum and brother on the journey home.
"They were all dead sound, shaking our hands after the game - it was like facing a group of normal fellas.
"Now we can't wait for the second match."
We Will Still Win the League'
Andy Kirby coaches the Collegiate vets team, who won the Premier Division title last season, together with Paul Maguire.
"We scored one-nil up and had a