🔗 Share this article

What do you boost a excellent veteran team who have won back-to-back championships, including a double triumph with 30 wins from thirty-two matches?

Sign a group of ex- professionals who have competed at the elite tier of club football and global soccer as you target more silverware.

A Manchester club has an non-professional veterans squad with nine ex- Premier League footballers in their active squad.

222 Top Division Scores, Three Hundred Twenty-Five International Caps

The team Veterans Over 35s are located in south Manchester and compete in the Cheshire Veterans League Premier Tier.

The squad list this season boasts 9 former Premier League players, with a collective 1,801 top-flight appearances.

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

The squad feature one forward, who netted thirty-seven scores in 117 games for Newcastle United after joining them for nine million pounds from Bundesliga club Freiburg in January 2012.

Cisse made his first appearance for Wythenshawe in their last home match against defending title holders their rivals and netted all six goals in a six-two victory - including a 32-minute opening period hat-trick.

The team for this campaign also includes ex- pros such as England and Anfield forward Emile Heskey, Hull and Burnley FC midfielder George Boyd, Everton forward Oumar Niasse, Wigan Athletic full-back Maynor Figueroa, City duo Stephen Ireland and Nedum Onuoha and Premier League championship victors Joleon Lescott and Danny Drinkwater.

Together, the former top-flight players have claimed fifteen major honors and transferred for combined transfer sums of about £123m.

Household Names and International Players

Ireland began playing for the side in pre-season this summer through close friend and current team player Blake Norton, and the ex- Irish midfielder then invited other ex-pros, who all compete in a midweek small-sided game, to join in.

Former Senegalese forward Niasse, who netted 12 goals in 65 Premier League games for Everton and even now attends their matches at Goodison Park, also had his first appearance against the opposition - who are based in Liverpool and use an Blue warm-up gear as their strip.

"My mate Stephen told me 'come and have a game, it's good fun'," said Niasse.

"After that he told me we were facing a side from Liverpool and the surprise I had when I noticed them sporting Everton kits - I thought this is strange 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 fans who turn up and watch are happy and to give someone's moment if they watch us playing there and to pose us queries - it's more like the joy of us getting somewhere we can play, with structure of course."

So great is the bench strength at Wythenshawe, Niasse had his debut at defender.

"It's a little unusual but then, I love running and just go forward - I'm not defending that much," he said.

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

"That running is what I'm looking for. It's enjoyable."

Unreal Scenario

In addition to Cisse's six goals on his first game, Ireland has netted eight in three games for the side, while Boyd scored 5 on his debut match and Lescott, a centre-half by position, notched a triple in one match up front.

The team are top of the Premier Division with three wins from 3 and a GD of plus nineteen.

One opponent, 38, who plays on the wing for the opposition, came up against former Latics defender Maynor Figueroa on the weekend - and had to tell his young boy who Heskey was.

He has appeared at 2 global tournaments for Honduras, in addition to featuring in more than 200 Premier League matches.

"It was spreading like wildfire they had these former top-flight stars," remarked the player.

"I felt I was a little awestruck facing him to be honest.

"Also Heskey came on and he's got 60-odd England caps.

"Our side held our own for a solid twenty minutes but then we had a man sent off and it was tough.

"Our group literally have not ceased chatting about it - I was calling my mum and brother on the way home.

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

"Now we are eager for the second match."

'We'll Still Win the League'

The manager manages the opposition vets side, who secured the Premier Division title last season, along with Paul Maguire.

"Our team scored 1-0 ahead and had a