🔗 Share this article

How can you enhance a stellar experienced team who have won consecutive championships, featuring a league-cup double with thirty wins from 32 games?

Sign a group of former professionals who have performed at the highest tier of club football and international football as you target more honors.

One Greater Manchester side has an amateur veterans squad with nine ex- Premier League footballers in their present squad.

222 Top Division Scores, 325 International Caps

Wythenshawe Vets Over 35s are based in southern the city and compete in the Cheshire-based Veterans Division Top Division.

The roster this season features nine ex- top-flight players, with a collective 1,801 top-flight matches.

The high-profile roster also includes over 220 top division scores and 325 international caps.

The squad feature one forward, who netted thirty-seven scores in 117 appearances for Newcastle United after joining them for £9m from German league side SC Freiburg in January 2012.

Cisse made his debut for the team in their most recent home match versus defending champions Collegiate Old Boys and netted all six goals in a 6-2 win - including a 32-minute first-half triple.

Wythenshawe's squad for this campaign also features former professionals such as English and Anfield striker Emile Heskey, Hull and Burnley winger George Boyd, Everton forward Oumar Niasse, Wigan Athletic full-back Maynor Figueroa, Manchester City pair Stephen Ireland and Nedum Onuoha and Premier League title winners Joleon Lescott and Danny Drinkwater.

In total, the ex- top-flight footballers have secured 15 big trophies and transferred for combined transfer sums of approximately £123 million.

Well-Known Names and Global Players

Stephen Ireland started playing for the team in preseason this summer through close friend and present team player Blake Norton, and the former Republic of Ireland midfielder then invited additional former professionals, who all compete in a weekly nine-a-side game, to join in.

Ex- Senegal striker Oumar Niasse, who netted twelve goals in sixty-five Premier League matches for the Toffees and even now attends their home games, also had his first appearance versus Collegiate OB - who are located in the city and use an Everton training kit as their strip.

"A mate Stephen told me 'come and play, it's a laugh'," said the striker.

"After that he told me we were facing a side from Liverpool and the shock I had when I noticed them wearing Blue kits - I say this is strange for me!

"When you still love football and you know you can still do it, anywhere you can kick a ball, what are you going to do?

"The spectators who come and watch are happy and to make someone's day if they watch us competing there and to ask us questions - it's more like the pleasure of us getting a place we can enjoy football, with structure of course."

Such is the bench strength at Wythenshawe, he had his first game at full-back.

"It's a bit unusual but then, I love sprinting and just go inside - I'm not defending that much," he added.

"I warn my centre-back 'I'm not staying' and that I'm just going to continue running.

"The movement is what I'm looking for. It's good fun."

Dreamlike' Experience

Along with Cisse's 6 goals on his first game, Ireland has netted 8 in three appearances for the side, while Boyd scored five on his debut match and Lescott, a centre-half by trade, notched a triple in one game up front.

The team are top of the Premier Division with three victories from 3 and a GD of +19.

Paul Barrow, thirty-eight, who plays on the flank for Collegiate OB, faced former Latics defender Maynor Figueroa on the weekend - and had to tell his young son who Emile Heskey was.

He has played at 2 World Cups for Honduras, in as well as featuring in over two hundred Premier League matches.

"It was going round like a rumor they had these former top-flight stars," said the player.

"I think I was a bit starstruck facing him to be honest.

"Also Heskey came on and he's has over 60 England appearances.

"Our side competed well for a solid 20 minutes but then we had a man dismissed and it was hard.

"Our group literally have not stopped talking about it - I was calling my mum and sibling on the way home.

"The opponents were all dead sound, shaking our hands after the game - it was like playing a bunch of regular guys.

"Now we can't wait for the return match."

'We'll Still Win the Title'

Andy Kirby coaches the Collegiate veterans side, who secured the Top Tier championship last season, together with Paul Maguire.

"Our team went 1-0 ahead and had a