Introduce the Weekend League Club Boasting Nearly Two Thousand Top-Flight Appearances
How do you boost a outstanding veteran team who have secured back-to-back titles, featuring a double triumph boasting thirty wins from 32 games?
Sign a collection of ex- professionals who have competed at the elite tier of club football and international football as you target more silverware.
A Manchester team fields an non-professional vets squad with 9 former top-flight footballers in their active roster.
Two Hundred Twenty-Two Top Division Goals, Three Hundred Twenty-Five International Caps
The team Vets Over 35s are located in southern Manchester and compete in the Cheshire Veterans League Top Division.
Their squad list this season boasts nine former Premier League players, with a collective over 1,800 Premier League matches.
The elite roster also includes 222 top division scores and over 320 global caps.
The squad include Papiss Cisse, who notched thirty-seven goals in 117 games for his former club after joining them for £9m from German league side SC Freiburg in January 2012.
He made his debut for the team in their most recent home-field game against reigning champions Collegiate Old Boys and scored every one of the six goals in a 6-2 victory - featuring a half-hour first-half triple.
Wythenshawe's squad for this campaign also features former professionals such as English and Anfield striker Emile Heskey, Hull and Burnley FC winger George Boyd, Everton forward Oumar Niasse, Wigan Athletic full-back Maynor Figueroa, Manchester City pair Stephen Ireland and Nedum Onuoha and Premier League championship winners Joleon Lescott and Danny Drinkwater.
In total, the former top-flight footballers have claimed fifteen significant trophies and transferred for total transfer fees of about £123 million.
Famous Names and Global Stars
Stephen Ireland started playing for the team during preseason this summer through close friend and current Wythenshawe player Blake Norton, and the ex- Irish player then invited other ex-pros, who all play in a weekly nine-a-side game, to join in.
Former Senegal striker Oumar Niasse, who scored 12 goals in sixty-five top-flight games for the Toffees and even now attends their home games, also made his first appearance against Collegiate OB - who are located in the city and use an Blue training kit as their uniform.
"A mate Stephen Ireland said 'join and have a game, it's good fun'," said Niasse.
"Then he told me we were facing a team from the city and the shock I had when I saw them wearing Blue kits - I thought this is wrong for me!
"If you still love the game and you feel you can still do it, wherever you can kick a ball, what are you going to choose?
"The people who turn up and see are pleased and to make someone's moment if they see us playing there and to pose us queries - it's more like the joy of us getting a place we can play, with structure of course."
Such is the bench strength at Wythenshawe, he made his first game at defender.
"That's a bit unusual but then, I enjoy running and just go inside - I'm not defending that much," he added.
"I warn my centre-back 'I'm not staying' and that I'm just going to continue running.
"That running is what I'm looking for. It's good fun."
'Surreal Experience
In addition to Cisse's 6 scores on debut, Ireland has scored 8 in 3 appearances for Wythenshawe, while George Boyd hit 5 on his first match and Lescott, a centre-half by trade, notched a triple in one game as a striker.
The team are leading of the Premier Tier with 3 wins from 3 and a GD of +19.
One opponent, 38, who plays on the wing for the opposition, faced ex- Latics defender Figueroa on Sunday - and had to explain his nine-year-old boy who Heskey was.
Figueroa has appeared at 2 World Cups for his country, in as well as featuring in over two hundred top-flight matches.
"The news was going round like wildfire they had all these ex-Premier League stars," remarked Barrow.
"I think I was a little starstruck facing him to be honest.
"Even Heskey got on and he's got 60-odd English caps.
"We competed well for a good twenty minutes but then we had a man dismissed and it was tough.
"We literally haven't ceased chatting about it - I was calling my mother and sibling on the journey home.
"They were all friendly, shaking our hands after the match - it was like facing a bunch of normal fellas.
"Now we are eager for the second fixture."
'We'll Still Win the Title'
The manager manages the opposition vets side, who secured the Premier Tier championship the previous campaign, along with Paul Maguire.
"Our team scored 1-0 up and had a