🔗 Share this article Introduce this Sunday Division Team Featuring Nearly Two Thousand English Top Division Appearances This bench for the team Veterans in a six-two win against Collegiate Old Boys on October 19th (from left to right) - one player, Papiss Cisse, a teammate, Blake Norton, Maynor Figueroa, Dean Warburton and Emile Heskey What do you boost a excellent experienced side that have secured back-to-back championships, featuring a double triumph with 30 wins from 32 games? Bring in a raft of former pro players who have played at the highest tier of club football and global football as you pursue additional silverware. A Manchester side fields an amateur vets team with 9 former top-flight footballers in their current roster. 222 Premier League Goals, 325 Global Caps The team Veterans Over-35s are based in south Manchester and play in the Cheshire Vets League Premier Division. The lineup this campaign features nine ex- Premier League footballers, with a total over 1,800 Premier League matches. This star-studded squad also boasts over 220 Premier League goals and over 320 global caps. The squad include Papiss Cisse, who netted thirty-seven goals in 117 appearances for his former club after joining them for nine million pounds from Bundesliga club Freiburg in 2012. Cisse made his debut for Wythenshawe in their most recent home game against defending champions their rivals and scored all six scores in a six-two win - featuring a 32-minute opening period hat-trick. Wythenshawe's team for this season also includes former pros such as English and Anfield striker Emile Heskey, Hull and Burnley FC winger George Boyd, Everton striker Oumar Niasse, Wigan full-back Maynor Figueroa, City duo Stephen Ireland and Nedum Onuoha and Premier League title victors Joleon Lescott and Danny Drinkwater. Collectively, the former Premier League players have secured 15 significant trophies and transferred for total transfer fees of approximately £123m. Household Figures and Global Stars Stephen Ireland won six Irish appearances, netting four goals Ireland began turning out for the team in preseason this season through good friend and current team player Blake Norton, and the former Republic of Ireland player then invited additional former professionals, who all play in a weekly nine-a-side match, to participate. Ex- Senegal striker Niasse, who netted 12 scores in 65 top-flight matches for Everton and still goes to their home games, also had his first appearance against Collegiate OB - who are located in the city and wear an Blue training kit as their uniform. Oumar Niasse featured for Everton from 2016 and 2020 "A friend Stephen told me 'come and play, it's good fun'," said Niasse. "After that he told me we were playing a team from the city and the surprise I had when I saw them sporting Blue kits - I say this is wrong for me! "When you still love the game and you feel you can still do it, wherever you can play, what are you going to do? "Those people who turn up and see are pleased and to give someone's day if they watch us competing there and to pose us questions - it's more like the joy of us having a place we can enjoy football, with structure of course." Such is the bench strength at Wythenshawe, Niasse made his first game at defender. "It's a bit unusual but then, I love sprinting and just move forward - I'm not defending that much," he said. "I tell my centre-back 'I'm not hanging back' and that I'm just going to continue attacking. "That movement is what I'm looking for. It's enjoyable." Ex- Wigan Athletic defender Maynor Figueroa is playing for the team 'Surreal Scenario Along with the forward's 6 goals on debut, Stephen Ireland has scored eight in three appearances for Wythenshawe, while George Boyd scored 5 on his first match and Lescott, a defender by position, scored a hat-trick in one match up front. Wythenshawe are top of the Top Tier with 3 wins from 3 and a GD of plus nineteen. Paul Barrow, 38, who features on the flank for Collegiate OB, faced ex- Latics defender Maynor Figueroa on the weekend - and had to explain his young boy who Heskey was. Figueroa has played at two World Cups for his country, in as well as playing in more than two hundred Premier League matches. "The news was going round like a rumor they had these former top-flight stars," remarked the player. "I felt I was a bit starstruck facing Figueroa to be honest. "Even Emile [Heskey] got on and he's has 60-odd England appearances. "Our side competed well for a solid twenty minutes but then we had a player dismissed and it was hard. "We literally haven't stopped chatting about it - I was phoning my mother and sibling on the way home. "The opponents were all dead sound, shaking our hands after the match - it was like facing a group of normal fellas. "Now we can't wait for the return match." 'We'll Still Take the Title' Andy Kirby manages the opposition vets team, who secured the Top Division title last season, together with his co-manager. "We went 1-0 up and had a