Discover the Weekend League Squad Boasting Nearly Two Thousand Top-Flight Games
How can you boost a stellar experienced side who have won consecutive titles, featuring a league-cup double boasting thirty victories from thirty-two matches?
Recruit a group of ex- professionals that have played at the highest level of club football and international soccer as you aim for further silverware.
One Greater Manchester club has an non-professional vets team with 9 former Premier League players in their active squad.
222 Premier League Scores, Three Hundred Twenty-Five International Appearances
Wythenshawe Vets Over 35s are based in south the city and play in the Cheshire Vets League Premier Tier.
Their squad list this campaign includes 9 ex- top-flight players, with a collective nearly 1,800 Premier League matches.
This high-profile squad also contains over 220 top division goals and over 320 international caps.
The squad include one forward, who netted thirty-seven scores in over 100 appearances for Newcastle United after signing for them for £9m from German league club Freiburg in 2012.
He made his debut for Wythenshawe in their most recent home game versus defending champions Collegiate Old Boys and netted every one of the six goals in a 6-2 win - including a 32-minute opening period hat-trick.
The squad for this campaign also includes ex- professionals such as English and Anfield forward Emile Heskey, Hull and Burnley midfielder George Boyd, Everton forward Oumar Niasse, Wigan Athletic defender Maynor Figueroa, City duo Stephen Ireland and Nedum Onuoha and top-flight championship victors Joleon Lescott and Danny Drinkwater.
Together, the ex- Premier League players have secured fifteen major trophies and moved for combined transfer sums of approximately £123 million.
Household Figures and Global Players
Stephen Ireland started playing for the team during pre-season this summer through close mate and current Wythenshawe player Blake Norton, and the former Republic of Ireland midfielder then asked other ex-pros, who all play in a weekly small-sided match, to participate.
Ex- Senegal forward Oumar Niasse, who netted twelve goals in 65 top-flight matches for Everton and still goes to their matches at Goodison Park, also made his debut against the opposition - who are based in the city and wear an Everton training kit as their strip.
"A friend Stephen Ireland told me 'join and play, it's a laugh'," commented the striker.
"Then he told me we were facing a team from the city and the surprise I had when I noticed them wearing Blue shirts - I say this is wrong for me!
"If you still enjoy the game and you know you can still do it, anywhere you can play, what are you going to do?
"Those fans who turn up and watch are happy and to make someone's moment if they see us competing there and to pose us questions - it's really about the pleasure of us getting somewhere we can enjoy football, with structure of course."
So great is the bench strength at the club, Niasse had his first game at defender.
"It's a little different but then, I enjoy sprinting and just go forward - I'm not staying back that much," he said.
"I tell my centre-back 'I'm not staying' and that I'm just going to continue attacking.
"That running is what I'm looking for. It's good fun."
'Surreal Feeling
In addition to the forward's six goals on debut, Ireland has netted eight in three appearances for the side, while Boyd hit 5 on his first match and Lescott, a defender by position, scored a hat-trick in one match as a striker.
The team are top of the Top Tier with 3 victories from three and a GD of plus nineteen.
Paul Barrow, thirty-eight, who plays on the wing for the opposition, came up against former Wigan defender Maynor Figueroa on Sunday - and had to tell his nine-year-old boy who Emile Heskey was.
Figueroa has appeared at two global tournaments for his country, in addition to featuring in more than two hundred Premier League matches.
"The news was spreading like a rumor they had all these ex-Premier League players," said the player.
"I felt I was a bit starstruck facing Figueroa to be honest.
"Even Heskey got on and he's has over 60 English appearances.
"Our side competed well for a solid twenty mins but then we had a man dismissed and it was hard.
"We really have not stopped talking about it - I was phoning my mum and sibling on the journey home.
"The opponents were all friendly, shaking our hands after the match - it was like playing a bunch of regular fellas.
"Now we can't wait for the return match."
We Will Still Win the League'
The manager manages the opposition vets side, who won the Premier Division title last season, together with his co-manager.
"We went one-nil up and had a