🔗 Share this article

How can you boost a excellent experienced side that have won back-to-back championships, including a league-cup double with 30 wins from 32 games?

Recruit a group of ex- professionals who have played at the top level of club football and international soccer as you pursue further honors.

One Manchester club fields an non-professional veterans squad with 9 ex- top-flight players in their active lineup.

222 Premier League Scores, 325 Global Caps

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

The squad list this campaign boasts nine former Premier League players, with a collective over 1,800 elite appearances.

This high-profile team also contains over 220 Premier League goals and over 320 global appearances.

They include one forward, who netted thirty-seven scores in over 100 games for Newcastle United after moving to them for £9m from Bundesliga side Freiburg in 2012.

Cisse had his first appearance for Wythenshawe in their last home game against reigning title holders Collegiate Old Boys and netted all six goals in a six-two victory - featuring a half-hour first-half hat-trick.

The roster for this campaign also features ex- pros such as English and Anfield striker Emile Heskey, Hull City and Burnley winger George Boyd, Everton forward Oumar Niasse, Wigan Athletic full-back Maynor Figueroa, Manchester City duo Stephen Ireland and Nedum Onuoha and Premier League title winners Joleon Lescott and Danny Drinkwater.

Together, the former top-flight players have secured fifteen big trophies and moved for combined transfer fees of about £123 million.

Well-Known Names and International Players

Ireland began turning out for the team during pre-season this summer through close mate and present team player Blake Norton, and the former Irish midfielder then invited other ex-pros, who all play in a midweek small-sided match, to join in.

Ex- Senegal striker Oumar Niasse, who scored twelve goals in sixty-five Premier League games for the Toffees and even now goes to their matches at Goodison Park, also made his first appearance against the opposition - who are based in the city and use an Blue warm-up gear as their uniform.

"My friend Stephen Ireland said 'come and play, it's a laugh'," commented the striker.

"After that he told me we were playing a side from the city and the shock I had when I noticed them sporting Everton kits - I say this is wrong for me!

"If you still love football and you feel you can still do it, anywhere you can kick a ball, what are you going to choose?

"Those fans who turn up and watch are happy and to make a moment if they see us playing there and to pose us questions - it's more like the pleasure of us having a place we can play, with organisation of course."

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

"It's a bit different but then, I enjoy sprinting and just go forward - I'm not defending that much," he added.

"I warn my defender 'I'm not staying' and that I'm just going to continue attacking.

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

Dreamlike' Experience

Along with Cisse's 6 goals on his first game, Stephen Ireland has netted eight in 3 games for Wythenshawe, while Boyd scored 5 on his debut appearance and Lescott, a defender by trade, notched a hat-trick in one game as a striker.

Wythenshawe are top of the Top Tier with three victories from three and a goal difference of +19.

One opponent, thirty-eight, who features on the flank for Collegiate OB, faced former Wigan full-back 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 Honduras, in addition to playing in more than two hundred Premier League matches.

"The news was spreading like a rumor they had these former top-flight stars," remarked the player.

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

"Even Emile [Heskey] got on and he's has 60-odd English caps.

"We competed well for a good twenty mins but then we had a man sent off and it was tough.

"Our group really have not ceased chatting about it - I was phoning my mum and sibling on the journey home.

"They were all dead sound, shaking our hands after the game - it was like playing a bunch of regular fellas.

"Now we are eager for the second match."

'We'll Still Take the Title'

Andy Kirby coaches the Collegiate veterans team, who secured the Premier Tier title the previous campaign, along with his co-manager.

"We scored one-nil ahead and had a