Meet this Weekend Division Team With Nearly Two Thousand Top-Flight Matches
What can you improve a excellent experienced team who have secured consecutive titles, including a double triumph with thirty wins from thirty-two games?
Sign a group of ex- pro players that have competed at the highest level of club and international football as you pursue additional honors.
One Greater Manchester club has an non-professional veterans team with 9 ex- Premier League players in their present squad.
Two Hundred Twenty-Two Top Division Goals, Three Hundred Twenty-Five International Appearances
Wythenshawe Veterans Over-35s are situated in southern Manchester and compete in the Cheshire-based Vets Division Premier Tier.
The lineup this campaign includes nine ex- top-flight players, with a collective nearly 1,800 Premier League appearances.
This star-studded roster also boasts 222 top division goals and over 320 international appearances.
The squad feature one forward, who notched thirty-seven goals in 117 appearances for his former club after joining them for ÂŁ9m from Bundesliga club Freiburg in January 2012.
He had his first appearance for Wythenshawe in their last home-field match versus reigning champions Collegiate Old Boys and scored all six scores in a 6-2 victory - including a 32-minute opening period hat-trick.
The squad for this campaign also includes ex- pros such as English and Liverpool forward Emile Heskey, Hull City and Burnley midfielder George Boyd, Everton striker Oumar Niasse, Wigan Athletic defender Maynor Figueroa, City pair Stephen Ireland and Nedum Onuoha and Premier League title victors Joleon Lescott and Danny Drinkwater.
Together, the ex- top-flight players have claimed 15 significant honors and moved for combined transfer sums of about ÂŁ123m.
Household Names and International Stars
Ireland began turning out for the team in pre-season this summer through good friend and present team teammate Blake Norton, and the former Irish midfielder then asked additional former professionals, who all play in a weekly nine-a-side game, to join in.
Ex- Senegal forward Oumar Niasse, who netted twelve scores in sixty-five top-flight matches for Everton and still goes to their home games, also made his debut against the opposition - who are based in the city and use an Everton warm-up gear as their uniform.
"My mate Stephen Ireland told me 'come and play, it's enjoyable'," commented the striker.
"After that he told me we were playing a side from Liverpool and the shock I had when I saw them sporting Blue shirts - I thought this is wrong for me!
"If you still love football and you know you can still do it, anywhere you can kick a ball, what are you going to choose?
"Those people who come and see are pleased and to give someone's day if they see us playing there and to ask us questions - it's more like the joy of us having a place we can enjoy football, with structure of course."
Such is the squad depth at the club, he had his debut at full-back.
"That's a bit different but then, I enjoy running and just go forward - I'm not defending that much," he said.
"I warn my defender 'I'm not hanging back' and that I'm just going to keep running.
"That movement is what I'm seeking. It's good fun."
Dreamlike' Experience
Along with the forward's six scores on his first game, Ireland has netted eight in 3 appearances for Wythenshawe, while George Boyd hit five on his debut match and Joleon Lescott, a defender by position, scored a hat-trick in one match as a striker.
Wythenshawe are top of the Top Tier with 3 wins from 3 and a goal difference of plus nineteen.
One opponent, thirty-eight, who features on the wing for the opposition, faced former Wigan defender Figueroa on Sunday - and had to tell his young boy who Emile Heskey was.
Figueroa has appeared at two World Cups for his country, in as well as featuring in more than two hundred top-flight matches.
"The news was spreading like a rumor they had these ex-Premier League players," 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 English appearances.
"We held our own for a good twenty minutes but then we had a man dismissed and it was tough.
"We really have not stopped talking about it - I was calling my mother and sibling on the journey home.
"They were all really nice, shaking our hands after the match - it was like playing a bunch of normal guys.
"Now we are eager for the return match."
We Will Still Take the Title'
The manager coaches the Collegiate veterans side, who secured the Premier Tier championship the previous campaign, along with his co-manager.
"Our team went one-nil up and had a