Discover the Weekend League Team Featuring Over 1,800 Premier League Games
What can you improve a outstanding experienced squad that have claimed back-to-back championships, featuring a league-cup double with thirty victories from thirty-two matches?
Bring in a raft of ex- professionals that have performed at the highest tier of club football and international football as you target further trophies.
One Greater Manchester side fields an amateur veterans team with 9 ex- Premier League footballers in their current squad.
Two Hundred Twenty-Two Top Division Goals, 325 Global Appearances
Wythenshawe Veterans Over-35s are located in southern the city and compete in the Cheshire Vets League Top Tier.
The roster this season includes nine former top-flight players, with a collective nearly 1,800 top-flight appearances.
This high-profile roster also includes over 220 Premier League goals and 325 international appearances.
They include one forward, who notched 37 scores in 117 games for his former club after moving to them for £9m from German league side Freiburg in 2012.
He had his first appearance for the team in their last home-field match versus reigning title holders Collegiate Old Boys and scored all six goals in a six-two win - including a 32-minute opening period hat-trick.
The team for this campaign also features former pros such as England and Liverpool striker Emile Heskey, Hull City and Burnley midfielder George Boyd, Toffees striker Oumar Niasse, Wigan Athletic defender Maynor Figueroa, Manchester City pair Stephen Ireland and Nedum Onuoha and Premier League title victors Joleon Lescott and Danny Drinkwater.
In total, the ex- top-flight players have claimed fifteen major honors and transferred for total transfer sums of approximately £123 million.
Household Figures and International Players
Stephen Ireland started turning out for the side during preseason this season through close friend and present Wythenshawe player Blake Norton, and the ex- Irish player then asked additional ex-pros, who all play in a weekly nine-a-side game, to participate.
Former Senegalese forward Oumar Niasse, who netted 12 scores in sixty-five Premier League games for Everton and still goes to their matches at Goodison Park, also made his first appearance versus the opposition - who are located in the city and wear an Blue training kit as their strip.
"My friend Stephen Ireland told me 'join and have a game, it's enjoyable'," said Niasse.
"Then he told me we were facing a side from the city and the shock I had when I saw them wearing Blue shirts - I say this is wrong for me!
"When you still enjoy football and you know you can still do it, wherever you can kick a ball, what are you going to choose?
"The spectators who come and see are happy and to make a moment if they watch us competing there and to pose us queries - it's more like the pleasure of us getting somewhere we can enjoy football, with organisation of course."
Such is the bench strength at the club, Niasse made his debut at full-back.
"That's a little different but then, I love running and just go forward - I'm not staying back that much," he added.
"I warn my centre-back 'I'm not hanging back' and that I'm just going to continue running.
"That movement is what I'm looking for. It's enjoyable."
Unreal Feeling
In addition to the forward's six scores on debut, Ireland has netted eight in 3 games for Wythenshawe, while George Boyd hit 5 on his debut appearance and Lescott, a defender by trade, notched a triple in one match up front.
The team are top of the Top Division with 3 wins from three and a goal difference of +19.
One opponent, 38, who features on the flank for the opposition, came up against former Wigan defender Maynor Figueroa on Sunday - and had to tell his nine-year-old son who Heskey was.
Figueroa has played at two World Cups for his country, in addition to featuring in over 200 top-flight matches.
"The news was going round like wildfire they had these former top-flight players," remarked the player.
"I felt I was a bit starstruck facing Figueroa to be honest.
"Also Heskey came 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 hard.
"Our group literally haven't ceased talking about it - I was phoning my mum and brother on the way home.
"They were all dead sound, shaking our hands after the match - it was like playing a group of normal guys.
"Now we are eager for the return match."
'We'll Still Take the League'
Andy Kirby coaches the opposition veterans side, who won the Top Division championship the previous campaign, together with Paul Maguire.
"Our team went one-nil up and had a