Meet the Sunday League Club Boasting Nearly Two Thousand Top-Flight Appearances
How do you improve a excellent veteran team who have secured back-to-back titles, featuring a league-cup double boasting 30 victories from thirty-two games?
Sign a collection of former pro players who have performed at the highest tier of club and global soccer as you pursue additional honors.
One Manchester side boasts an non-professional vets team with 9 ex- Premier League footballers in their current squad.
Two Hundred Twenty-Two Premier League Goals, 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 Division.
Their squad list this season boasts nine former top-flight footballers, with a collective 1,801 top-flight games.
The elite team also contains over 220 top division scores and over 320 global appearances.
They feature one forward, who scored 37 goals in 117 games for Newcastle United after signing for them for nine million pounds from German league club Freiburg in January 2012.
He made his first appearance for Wythenshawe in their last home game versus defending title holders Collegiate Old Boys and scored every one of the six scores in a six-two win - including a 32-minute opening period hat-trick.
The squad for this campaign also features ex- professionals such as England and Liverpool forward Emile Heskey, Hull and Burnley winger George Boyd, Everton striker Oumar Niasse, Wigan defender Maynor Figueroa, Manchester City duo Stephen Ireland and Nedum Onuoha and top-flight title victors Joleon Lescott and Danny Drinkwater.
In total, the former top-flight players have won fifteen significant honors and moved for total transfer fees of approximately £123 million.
Household Names and International Players
Stephen Ireland started playing for the team during preseason this summer through good friend and present team teammate Blake Norton, and the former Republic of Ireland midfielder then asked other former professionals, who all compete in a midweek small-sided game, to participate.
Ex- Senegalese forward Niasse, who scored 12 goals in 65 Premier League matches for Everton and still goes to their home games, also had his first appearance versus Collegiate OB - who are based in the city and use an Blue training kit as their uniform.
"A friend Stephen Ireland said 'come and play, it's good fun'," commented Niasse.
"Then he informed me we were facing a side from the city and the surprise I had when I saw them wearing Blue shirts - I say this is strange for me!
"If you still enjoy football and you feel you can still do it, wherever you can kick a ball, what are you going to choose?
"The fans who come and see are happy and to make a moment if they watch us playing there and to pose us queries - it's more like the joy of us having somewhere we can enjoy football, with organisation of course."
So great is the squad depth at Wythenshawe, he made his debut at defender.
"That's a little unusual but then, I enjoy running 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 keep attacking.
"That running is what I'm seeking. It's enjoyable."
Unreal Experience
In addition to the forward's six goals on debut, Ireland has scored eight in three games for the side, while Boyd hit 5 on his debut appearance and Lescott, a defender by position, scored a triple in one game up front.
The team are top of the Premier Division with 3 wins from three and a GD of plus nineteen.
One opponent, thirty-eight, who plays on the flank for Collegiate OB, faced former Latics full-back Maynor Figueroa on Sunday - and had to tell his nine-year-old son who Emile Heskey was.
Figueroa has played at two World Cups for his country, in as well as featuring in more than 200 Premier League matches.
"The news was spreading like wildfire they had all these ex-Premier League players," remarked the player.
"I felt I was a little awestruck facing Figueroa to be honest.
"Also Heskey came on and he's got 60-odd English appearances.
"We held our own for a solid 20 minutes but then we had a man sent off and it was hard.
"Our group really have not stopped chatting about it - I was calling my mother and sibling on the way home.
"The opponents were all friendly, shaking our hands after the game - it was like playing a group of normal guys.
"Now we can't wait for the return fixture."
'We'll Still Win the Title'
Andy Kirby manages the Collegiate vets side, who secured the Top Division title last season, together with Paul Maguire.
"Our team went 1-0 ahead and had a