Meet this Weekend League Squad Featuring Over 1,800 Premier League Games
What can you boost a stellar veteran side who have won back-to-back championships, featuring a league-cup double boasting 30 wins from thirty-two matches?
Bring in a group of ex- professionals that have performed at the top tier of club and international soccer as you aim for additional silverware.
A Greater Manchester side has an non-professional vets team with 9 ex- Premier League footballers in their current lineup.
222 Premier League Goals, 325 Global Appearances
The team Vets Over-35s are situated in south Manchester and compete in the Cheshire-based Veterans League Premier Division.
The roster this campaign features nine former Premier League players, with a combined over 1,800 Premier League matches.
This star-studded roster also includes over 220 Premier League scores and 325 international appearances.
The squad include one forward, who notched thirty-seven scores in over 100 games for his former club after moving to them for nine million pounds from German league club SC Freiburg in 2012.
Cisse had his debut for the team in their most recent home-field match against reigning champions their rivals and scored every one of the six goals in a 6-2 win - including a 32-minute first-half hat-trick.
Wythenshawe's roster for this campaign also includes ex- pros such as English and Liverpool striker Emile Heskey, Hull and Burnley midfielder George Boyd, Everton forward Oumar Niasse, Wigan full-back Maynor Figueroa, Manchester City duo Stephen Ireland and Nedum Onuoha and Premier League championship victors Joleon Lescott and Danny Drinkwater.
In total, the former Premier League footballers have won 15 big honors and moved for total transfer fees of about £123 million.
Famous Names and International Players
Stephen Ireland started playing for the side during preseason this summer through good friend and present team teammate Blake Norton, and the ex- Republic of Ireland midfielder then asked additional ex-pros, who all compete in a midweek nine-a-side game, to participate.
Former Senegalese forward Niasse, who netted 12 goals in sixty-five Premier League games for Everton and still goes to their home games, also made his debut versus Collegiate OB - who are based in the city and wear an Blue warm-up gear as their uniform.
"A mate Stephen Ireland said 'come and play, it's a laugh'," commented the striker.
"Then he informed me we were playing a team from the city and the shock I had when I noticed them sporting Everton shirts - I thought this is wrong for me!
"If you still love the game and you feel you can still do it, anywhere you can play, what are you going to choose?
"The spectators who turn up and see are pleased and to make someone's day if they see us competing there and to pose us questions - it's more like the pleasure of us having a place we can enjoy football, with structure of course."
So great is the bench strength at the club, he made his first game at full-back.
"It's a little different but then, I enjoy sprinting and just move inside - I'm not defending that much," he said.
"I warn my centre-back 'I'm not staying' and that I'm just going to keep running.
"That running is what I'm seeking. It's good fun."
'Surreal Feeling
In addition to the forward's 6 goals on debut, Stephen Ireland has scored 8 in 3 appearances for Wythenshawe, while Boyd scored 5 on his debut match and Joleon Lescott, a defender by trade, scored a hat-trick in one game up front.
Wythenshawe are top of the Top Division with three wins from three and a goal difference of plus nineteen.
Paul Barrow, 38, who features on the flank for Collegiate OB, faced former Wigan defender Figueroa on Sunday - and had to tell his young boy who Heskey was.
He has played at two World Cups for Honduras, in as well as playing in more than two hundred Premier League games.
"The news was going round like wildfire they had these ex-Premier League stars," remarked the player.
"I think I was a bit starstruck playing against him to be honest.
"Also Heskey came on and he's has 60-odd England caps.
"Our side held our own for a solid 20 minutes but then we had a player dismissed and it was hard.
"Our group literally haven't stopped chatting about it - I was phoning my mum and brother on the journey home.
"They were all dead sound, shaking our hands after the game - it was like playing a bunch of regular guys.
"Now we are eager for the return fixture."
We Will Still Take the Title'
The manager manages the opposition vets side, who won the Top Division championship the previous campaign, along with Paul Maguire.
"Our team went 1-0 ahead and had a