🔗 Share this article

What can you boost a excellent veteran side who have won back-to-back championships, featuring a double triumph with thirty wins from thirty-two matches?

Recruit a collection of former pro players who have performed at the top tier of club football and global soccer as you aim for additional silverware.

A Manchester team fields an amateur veterans squad with 9 ex- Premier League players in their current roster.

222 Top Division Scores, Three Hundred Twenty-Five Global Appearances

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

Their lineup this season features 9 ex- top-flight players, with a total over 1,800 top-flight matches.

The star-studded team also includes over 220 top division scores and over 320 global appearances.

The squad feature one forward, who netted 37 scores in over 100 appearances for Newcastle United after moving to them for £9m from German league club Freiburg in 2012.

Cisse made his debut for Wythenshawe in their last home match against defending title holders their rivals and scored all six scores in a 6-2 victory - featuring a half-hour first-half triple.

The roster for this campaign also includes ex- professionals such as England and Anfield forward Emile Heskey, Hull City and Burnley FC winger George Boyd, Toffees forward Oumar Niasse, Wigan full-back Maynor Figueroa, City pair Stephen Ireland and Nedum Onuoha and Premier League title victors Joleon Lescott and Danny Drinkwater.

In total, the ex- top-flight players have claimed 15 major honors and transferred for total transfer fees of about £123m.

Well-Known Figures and International Players

Ireland began turning out for the team in preseason this summer through close friend and present team teammate Blake Norton, and the ex- Republic of Ireland midfielder then asked other former professionals, who all compete in a weekly nine-a-side game, to join in.

Ex- Senegal forward Oumar Niasse, who netted 12 scores in sixty-five Premier League matches for the Toffees and even now goes to their home games, also made his debut against the opposition - who are based in the city and wear an Blue warm-up gear as their uniform.

"My friend Stephen told me 'join and play, it's enjoyable'," commented the striker.

"Then he informed me we were facing a side from Liverpool and the shock I had when I noticed them wearing Everton shirts - I thought this is strange for me!

"When you still love the game and you know you can still play, anywhere you can play, what are you going to do?

"The spectators who turn up and watch are happy and to make someone's moment if they see us playing there and to ask us queries - it's really about the pleasure of us having somewhere we can enjoy football, with organisation of course."

So great is the squad depth at the club, he made his debut at full-back.

"It's a little different but then, I enjoy sprinting and just move inside - I'm not staying back that much," he said.

"I tell my centre-back 'I'm not hanging back' and that I'm just going to keep running.

"The running is what I'm seeking. It's enjoyable."

'Surreal Feeling

Along with Cisse's six goals on debut, Stephen Ireland has scored 8 in three games for Wythenshawe, while Boyd scored five on his first appearance and Lescott, a centre-half by trade, scored a hat-trick in one game as a striker.

Wythenshawe are leading of the Top Tier with three wins from three and a goal difference of plus nineteen.

One opponent, 38, who plays on the flank for Collegiate OB, faced former Latics full-back Figueroa on the weekend - and had to tell his nine-year-old boy who Heskey was.

He has appeared at 2 global tournaments for his country, in addition to playing in over 200 Premier League games.

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

"I think I was a little awestruck playing against him to be honest.

"Also Heskey came on and he's got over 60 English appearances.

"Our side competed well for a solid twenty mins but then we had a man dismissed and it was tough.

"Our group really haven't ceased chatting about it - I was calling my mother and sibling on the journey home.

"They were all dead sound, shaking our hands after the game - it was like facing a group of normal guys.

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

'We'll Still Win the Title'

The manager manages the opposition vets side, who secured the Premier Tier title the previous campaign, together with his co-manager.

"Our team scored 1-0 up and had a