Meet this Weekend League Club Boasting Nearly Two Thousand Premier League Games
What can you improve a stellar veteran side that have secured consecutive titles, featuring a league-cup double boasting 30 victories from thirty-two matches?
Recruit a collection of former pro players who have competed at the top level of club and international football as you pursue additional silverware.
One Manchester club has an non-professional vets squad with nine ex- Premier League players in their active lineup.
Two Hundred Twenty-Two Top Division Scores, Three Hundred Twenty-Five Global Caps
Wythenshawe Veterans Over-35s are located in southern the city and compete in the Cheshire Veterans League Premier Tier.
Their squad list this campaign boasts 9 ex- top-flight players, with a combined nearly 1,800 elite appearances.
The high-profile team also contains 222 top division goals and over 320 international caps.
The squad feature Papiss Cisse, who notched 37 goals in over 100 games for his former club after moving to them for nine million pounds from Bundesliga club SC Freiburg in January 2012.
Cisse had his first appearance for the team in their most recent home-field game against defending title holders their rivals and scored all six goals in a six-two win - featuring a 32-minute opening period hat-trick.
The team for this campaign also features former professionals such as England and Anfield striker Emile Heskey, Hull and Burnley FC winger George Boyd, Everton striker Oumar Niasse, Wigan defender Maynor Figueroa, Manchester City pair Stephen Ireland and Nedum Onuoha and Premier League title victors Joleon Lescott and Danny Drinkwater.
Together, the former Premier League players have won fifteen major trophies and transferred for total transfer fees of about £123m.
Household Figures and Global Players
Stephen Ireland started playing for the side in preseason this season through close mate and present Wythenshawe player Blake Norton, and the former Republic of Ireland midfielder then invited other former professionals, who all compete in a midweek small-sided game, to participate.
Former Senegalese forward Niasse, who netted 12 goals in sixty-five Premier League games for the Toffees and still attends their home games, also made his first appearance versus Collegiate OB - who are located in Liverpool and wear an Blue warm-up gear as their uniform.
"My mate Stephen Ireland said 'come and play, it's enjoyable'," commented the striker.
"Then he told me we were playing a side from Liverpool and the shock I had when I noticed them sporting Everton kits - I thought this is strange for me!
"If you still enjoy the game and you feel you can still do it, anywhere you can kick a ball, what are you going to do?
"Those spectators who turn up and see are happy and to make someone's day if they see us competing there and to ask us queries - it's really about the pleasure of us having a place we can enjoy football, with structure of course."
Such is the strength in depth at the club, he made his debut at full-back.
"It's a little unusual but then, I love sprinting and just move inside - I'm not staying back that much," he said.
"I warn my centre-back 'I'm not staying' and that I'm just going to continue attacking.
"That running is what I'm after. It's good fun."
Unreal Scenario
Along with the forward's six goals on his first game, Stephen Ireland has netted 8 in 3 games for Wythenshawe, while Boyd scored 5 on his debut match and Joleon Lescott, a defender by trade, scored a triple in one game as a striker.
The team are top of the Top Tier with three wins from three and a goal difference of plus nineteen.
Paul Barrow, thirty-eight, who features on the flank for the opposition, faced ex- Latics defender Figueroa on Sunday - and had to tell his nine-year-old son who Heskey was.
He has appeared at 2 World Cups for Honduras, in as well as playing in over two hundred top-flight matches.
"It was spreading like a rumor they had all these former top-flight players," said the player.
"I felt I was a bit awestruck playing against him to be honest.
"Even Emile [Heskey] came on and he's got 60-odd English appearances.
"We competed well for a solid 20 mins but then we had a player dismissed and it was tough.
"Our group really haven't ceased talking about it - I was calling my mother and sibling on the journey home.
"The opponents were all dead sound, shaking our hands after the match - it was like facing a bunch of normal guys.
"Now we are eager for the second fixture."
'We'll Still Win the League'
The manager coaches the Collegiate vets side, who won the Top Tier title last season, together with Paul Maguire.
"We scored one-nil up and had a