🔗 Share this article

How can you boost a excellent veteran squad who have claimed back-to-back championships, featuring a double triumph with 30 victories from thirty-two matches?

Sign a group of ex- pro players that have played at the highest tier of club and global football as you target more honors.

A Manchester club boasts an amateur vets squad with 9 ex- Premier League players in their active squad.

222 Premier League Goals, Three Hundred Twenty-Five Global Appearances

The team Veterans Over 35s are situated in south Manchester and compete in the Cheshire Vets League Top Division.

The squad list this campaign boasts nine ex- Premier League footballers, with a collective nearly 1,800 elite games.

The high-profile team also includes over 220 Premier League goals and over 320 international caps.

The squad feature one forward, who notched 37 goals in over 100 appearances for his former club after moving to them for £9m from German league club Freiburg in January 2012.

He made his debut for the team in their last home match versus defending title holders their rivals and scored all six goals in a six-two victory - including a 32-minute first-half hat-trick.

Wythenshawe's roster for this season also features former pros such as England and Liverpool forward Emile Heskey, Hull City and Burnley winger George Boyd, Everton striker Oumar Niasse, Wigan defender Maynor Figueroa, City duo Stephen Ireland and Nedum Onuoha and Premier League championship winners Joleon Lescott and Danny Drinkwater.

Collectively, the former Premier League footballers have secured 15 major honors and moved for total transfer fees of around £123m.

Famous Figures and International Players

Ireland started playing for the side in preseason this summer through good friend and current team player Blake Norton, and the ex- Irish midfielder then asked other former professionals, who all compete in a weekly small-sided match, to join in.

Former Senegal forward Niasse, who netted twelve scores in sixty-five top-flight games for the Toffees and still attends their home games, also had his debut versus Collegiate OB - who are based in Liverpool and use an Blue warm-up gear as their uniform.

"My mate Stephen Ireland said 'join and play, it's enjoyable'," said the striker.

"Then he told me we were facing a side from Liverpool and the shock I had when I noticed them wearing Blue shirts - I say this is strange for me!

"When you still enjoy football and you feel you can still do it, wherever you can play, what are you going to choose?

"Those spectators who come and watch are happy and to give someone's moment if they see us playing there and to pose us queries - it's really about the joy of us having a place we can play, with organisation of course."

Such is the squad depth at Wythenshawe, he had his debut at defender.

"It's a little different but then, I love running and just go forward - I'm not staying back that much," he added.

"I tell my centre-back 'I'm not staying' and that I'm just going to continue running.

"That movement is what I'm after. It's enjoyable."

Dreamlike' Feeling

Along with the forward's six scores on his first game, Stephen Ireland has scored 8 in three appearances for the side, while Boyd hit 5 on his first appearance and Joleon Lescott, a defender by position, notched a hat-trick in one match up front.

The team are top of the Premier Tier with three victories from 3 and a goal difference of plus nineteen.

Paul Barrow, thirty-eight, who plays on the wing for the opposition, came up against former Wigan defender Figueroa on the weekend - and had to tell his young son who Emile Heskey was.

Figueroa has appeared at 2 World Cups for his country, in as well as playing in more than 200 Premier League games.

"It was spreading like a rumor they had all these ex-Premier League stars," remarked Barrow.

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

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

"We competed well for a good 20 mins but then we had a man dismissed and it was tough.

"Our group really have not stopped talking about it - I was calling my mother and brother on the way home.

"They were all friendly, shaking our hands after the match - it was like facing a bunch of normal guys.

"Now we can't wait for the return match."

We Will Still Win the League'

The manager manages the Collegiate veterans team, who won the Top Division championship last season, together with Paul Maguire.

"We scored one-nil up and had a