Meet the Sunday League Team Boasting 1,800 English Top Division Games
How can you improve a outstanding veteran squad that have secured back-to-back championships, featuring a league-cup double boasting thirty victories from 32 matches?
Recruit a raft of former pro players that have performed at the top level of club football and international soccer as you target more trophies.
One Manchester club has an amateur veterans team with nine former top-flight footballers in their active squad.
Two Hundred Twenty-Two Top Division Scores, Three Hundred Twenty-Five Global Appearances
Wythenshawe Vets Over-35s are situated in southern the city and compete in the Cheshire-based Vets Division Top Tier.
Their lineup this season boasts 9 ex- top-flight footballers, with a collective nearly 1,800 top-flight appearances.
The star-studded team also contains 222 Premier League goals and over 320 global appearances.
They feature one forward, who notched 37 scores in over 100 games for his former club after joining them for nine million pounds from Bundesliga side SC Freiburg in January 2012.
He made his debut for Wythenshawe in their last home game against defending champions Collegiate Old Boys and netted all six scores in a six-two win - including a half-hour first-half triple.
Wythenshawe's roster for this campaign also includes former pros such as England and Anfield striker Emile Heskey, Hull City and Burnley FC winger George Boyd, Toffees striker Oumar Niasse, Wigan Athletic full-back Maynor Figueroa, City pair Stephen Ireland and Nedum Onuoha and top-flight championship winners Joleon Lescott and Danny Drinkwater.
Collectively, the former Premier League footballers have secured 15 big honors and moved for total transfer fees of about £123m.
Household Names and International Players
Stephen Ireland started turning out for the team during pre-season this season through close friend and present team teammate Blake Norton, and the ex- Republic of Ireland midfielder then asked additional former professionals, who all play in a weekly small-sided match, to participate.
Former Senegal striker Niasse, who scored 12 scores in sixty-five top-flight matches for the Toffees and still goes to their home games, also made his first appearance versus Collegiate OB - who are based in the city and wear an Everton warm-up gear as their strip.
"A friend Stephen said 'come and play, it's good fun'," said Niasse.
"After that he told me we were facing a team from the city and the surprise I had when I noticed them sporting Everton shirts - I thought this is wrong for me!
"When you still enjoy football and you feel you can still play, anywhere you can play, what are you going to do?
"Those fans who come and watch are happy and to make someone's moment if they watch us playing there and to pose us questions - it's more like the joy of us getting somewhere we can play, with structure of course."
Such is the squad depth at Wythenshawe, Niasse made his first game at defender.
"It's a bit different but then, I love sprinting and just move inside - I'm not defending that much," he said.
"I warn my centre-back 'I'm not staying' and that I'm just going to keep attacking.
"The running is what I'm looking for. It's good fun."
Dreamlike' Scenario
In addition to the forward's six scores on his first game, Ireland has scored 8 in 3 games for Wythenshawe, while Boyd hit 5 on his debut appearance and Joleon Lescott, a centre-half by trade, notched a hat-trick in one match as a striker.
Wythenshawe are leading of the Premier Division with 3 victories from 3 and a GD of +19.
One opponent, 38, who features on the wing for Collegiate OB, came up against former Latics defender Figueroa on Sunday - and had to explain his nine-year-old boy who Heskey was.
Figueroa has played at 2 global tournaments for Honduras, in addition to playing in over 200 top-flight matches.
"It was going round like a rumor they had these former top-flight players," remarked the player.
"I felt I was a bit starstruck playing against him to be honest.
"Also Emile [Heskey] came on and he's got 60-odd England appearances.
"Our side competed well for a solid 20 minutes but then we had a man sent off and it was hard.
"We really have not stopped chatting about it - I was phoning my mother and sibling on the journey home.
"They were all friendly, shaking our hands after the game - it was like facing a group of regular fellas.
"Now we are eager for the return fixture."
We Will Still Take the Title'
Andy Kirby coaches the Collegiate vets team, who won the Top Division championship the previous campaign, together with his co-manager.
"We went 1-0 ahead and had a