Introduce the Sunday Division Club With 1,800 English Top Division Appearances
How can you enhance a stellar experienced side who have won consecutive titles, featuring a league-cup double with 30 victories from 32 games?
Sign a collection of former pro players that have competed at the top tier of club and global football as you pursue additional silverware.
A Manchester club fields an amateur vets squad with nine ex- top-flight footballers in their active lineup.
222 Premier League Scores, Three Hundred Twenty-Five International Caps
Wythenshawe Veterans Over-35s are based in southern the city and play in the Cheshire-based Vets League Premier Tier.
Their lineup this campaign features 9 ex- Premier League players, with a combined nearly 1,800 Premier League appearances.
This elite squad also contains 222 top division goals and over 320 global caps.
The squad feature one forward, who notched thirty-seven scores in over 100 games for his former club after joining them for nine million pounds from Bundesliga side SC Freiburg in 2012.
He had his first appearance for Wythenshawe in their last home match versus reigning champions Collegiate Old Boys and netted every one of the six scores in a six-two win - featuring a half-hour opening period triple.
Wythenshawe's squad for this season also includes ex- pros such as English and Anfield forward Emile Heskey, Hull City and Burnley FC winger George Boyd, Everton forward Oumar Niasse, Wigan full-back Maynor Figueroa, City duo Stephen Ireland and Nedum Onuoha and top-flight title victors Joleon Lescott and Danny Drinkwater.
Collectively, the ex- top-flight players have secured fifteen major honors and transferred for combined transfer fees of approximately £123 million.
Famous Names and Global Players
Ireland started playing for the team during preseason this season through close friend and current Wythenshawe teammate Blake Norton, and the former Irish player then invited additional ex-pros, who all compete in a midweek small-sided match, to participate.
Ex- Senegalese forward Oumar Niasse, who netted 12 goals in 65 Premier League games for the Toffees and still attends their home games, also made his first appearance against Collegiate OB - who are based in Liverpool and wear an Blue training kit as their uniform.
"A friend Stephen said 'come and play, it's a laugh'," commented Niasse.
"After that he told me we were facing a team from Liverpool and the shock I had when I saw them sporting Blue shirts - I thought this is wrong for me!
"When you still love the game and you know 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 pleased and to give a day if they see us competing there and to pose us queries - it's more like the pleasure of us getting a place we can enjoy football, with organisation of course."
So great is the bench strength at Wythenshawe, Niasse made his debut at full-back.
"That's a bit unusual but then, I love running and just move inside - I'm not staying back that much," he added.
"I warn my centre-back 'I'm not hanging back' and that I'm just going to continue attacking.
"The running is what I'm looking for. It's good fun."
'Surreal Experience
Along with the forward's six goals on debut, Ireland has scored eight in 3 games for the side, while George Boyd hit five on his first appearance and Joleon Lescott, a defender by trade, notched a hat-trick in one match as a striker.
Wythenshawe are leading of the Premier Division with three wins from 3 and a goal difference of plus nineteen.
Paul Barrow, thirty-eight, who plays on the flank for Collegiate OB, came up against former Latics full-back Maynor Figueroa on the weekend - and had to explain his young son who Emile Heskey was.
He has played at 2 global tournaments for Honduras, in addition to featuring in more than 200 Premier League games.
"The news was going round like a rumor they had all these former top-flight stars," remarked the player.
"I think I was a bit starstruck playing against him to be honest.
"Even Emile [Heskey] came on and he's got 60-odd English appearances.
"Our side held our own for a good twenty minutes but then we had a player sent off and it was tough.
"We literally haven't stopped chatting about it - I was phoning my mother and sibling on the way home.
"They were all really nice, shaking our hands after the match - it was like facing a bunch of normal fellas.
"Now we are eager for the second match."
'We'll Still Win the Title'
Andy Kirby coaches the opposition vets team, who won the Top Division title the previous campaign, together with Paul Maguire.
"Our team went one-nil up and had a