Discover this Sunday Division Squad With Nearly Two Thousand English Top Division Appearances
What can you enhance a stellar veteran team who have won consecutive championships, including a league-cup double boasting thirty victories from 32 matches?
Recruit a raft of ex- pro players that have played at the top tier of club football and international football as you pursue more honors.
One Manchester team fields an amateur veterans team with 9 ex- Premier League players in their active squad.
Two Hundred Twenty-Two Premier League Scores, 325 Global Caps
Wythenshawe Veterans Over-35s are based in southern Manchester and play in the Cheshire Vets League Top Tier.
Their squad list this season includes 9 former top-flight footballers, with a collective over 1,800 top-flight appearances.
The elite roster also contains over 220 Premier League scores and over 320 global appearances.
The squad feature Papiss Cisse, who notched 37 scores in over 100 appearances for his former club after signing for them for nine million pounds from Bundesliga club SC Freiburg in January 2012.
Cisse made his debut for Wythenshawe in their most recent home-field match against reigning champions their rivals and netted all six goals in a six-two victory - featuring a half-hour opening period hat-trick.
The roster for this season also includes ex- pros such as English and Liverpool forward Emile Heskey, Hull and Burnley midfielder George Boyd, Everton forward Oumar Niasse, Wigan defender Maynor Figueroa, Manchester City pair Stephen Ireland and Nedum Onuoha and top-flight title winners Joleon Lescott and Danny Drinkwater.
In total, the ex- top-flight players have won fifteen significant honors and moved for combined transfer fees of around £123m.
Well-Known Names and International Stars
Stephen Ireland started playing for the team in pre-season this season through close friend and current team player Blake Norton, and the ex- Republic of Ireland player then invited other former professionals, who all play in a weekly small-sided match, to participate.
Ex- Senegalese striker Oumar Niasse, who scored twelve goals in sixty-five Premier League matches for Everton and still attends their home games, also made his first appearance versus Collegiate OB - who are based in Liverpool and wear an Everton training kit as their uniform.
"My mate Stephen told me 'join and have a game, it's a laugh'," said Niasse.
"After that he told me we were facing a team from the city and the shock I had when I noticed them wearing Blue shirts - I say this is wrong for me!
"When you still enjoy the game and you know you can still play, wherever you can kick a ball, what are you going to choose?
"The fans who come and watch are happy and to give someone's day if they watch us playing there and to ask us questions - it's really about the pleasure of us having a place we can play, with organisation of course."
Such is the bench strength at the club, Niasse had his debut at defender.
"It's a bit unusual but then, I love running and just move forward - I'm not staying back that much," he said.
"I tell my defender 'I'm not staying' and that I'm just going to keep attacking.
"The movement is what I'm after. It's enjoyable."
'Surreal Scenario
In addition to the forward's six scores on his first game, Ireland has netted 8 in 3 games for the side, while Boyd hit five on his first appearance and Joleon Lescott, a defender by position, scored a triple in one game as a striker.
Wythenshawe are leading of the Top Tier with 3 wins from 3 and a goal difference of plus nineteen.
One opponent, thirty-eight, who plays on the flank for the opposition, faced ex- Latics defender Figueroa on Sunday - and had to tell his young boy who Emile Heskey was.
Figueroa has appeared at 2 World Cups for Honduras, in as well as playing in more than 200 Premier League games.
"The news was spreading like a rumor they had all these former top-flight stars," said the player.
"I felt I was a bit awestruck facing him to be honest.
"Also Emile [Heskey] came on and he's has 60-odd England caps.
"Our side competed well for a solid twenty mins but then we had a player sent off and it was hard.
"We literally haven't ceased talking about it - I was phoning my mother and brother on the way home.
"The opponents were all friendly, shaking our hands after the game - it was like playing a group of regular guys.
"Now we can't wait for the return match."
We Will Still Take the Title'
The manager coaches the Collegiate vets side, who secured the Premier Tier title last season, together with Paul Maguire.
"Our team scored 1-0 up and had a