Introduce this Weekend League Team Boasting Nearly Two Thousand English Top Division Appearances
What can you boost a outstanding experienced team who have won consecutive championships, including a double triumph boasting 30 wins from thirty-two matches?
Bring in a raft of former professionals who have performed at the highest level of club and global football as you aim for more trophies.
One Greater Manchester team has an non-professional veterans team with 9 ex- top-flight players in their current lineup.
Two Hundred Twenty-Two Premier League Goals, 325 Global Appearances
The team Veterans Over-35s are situated in south Manchester and compete in the Cheshire-based Veterans League Premier Division.
Their roster this season includes nine former Premier League footballers, with a collective 1,801 Premier League games.
The elite team also includes over 220 Premier League goals and 325 international appearances.
They feature Papiss Cisse, who notched 37 scores in over 100 appearances for Newcastle United after signing for them for £9m from Bundesliga club Freiburg in January 2012.
He made his first appearance for the team in their most recent home-field match versus reigning champions Collegiate Old Boys and netted all six scores in a 6-2 victory - including a half-hour opening period triple.
The team for this campaign also includes former pros such as England and Liverpool striker Emile Heskey, Hull and Burnley winger George Boyd, Everton forward Oumar Niasse, Wigan Athletic full-back Maynor Figueroa, Manchester City duo Stephen Ireland and Nedum Onuoha and top-flight title victors Joleon Lescott and Danny Drinkwater.
In total, the ex- top-flight footballers have secured 15 major trophies and moved for combined transfer fees of approximately £123m.
Household Names and Global Players
Stephen Ireland began turning out for the team during preseason this season through close mate and current team player Blake Norton, and the ex- Irish midfielder then asked other ex-pros, who all compete in a weekly small-sided game, to join in.
Ex- Senegalese forward Oumar Niasse, who scored twelve scores in sixty-five top-flight matches for the Toffees and even now attends their matches at Goodison Park, also made his first appearance versus Collegiate OB - who are based in the city and wear an Everton warm-up gear as their uniform.
"My mate Stephen Ireland said 'join and have a game, it's enjoyable'," said the striker.
"Then he told me we were playing a team from the city and the surprise I had when I saw them sporting Everton shirts - I thought this is strange 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 spectators who come and see are pleased and to give someone's moment if they see us playing there and to pose us queries - it's more like the joy of us getting a place we can play, with structure of course."
So great is the bench strength at the club, Niasse had his debut at defender.
"That's a bit different but then, I love running and just go forward - I'm not defending that much," he added.
"I tell my defender 'I'm not hanging back' and that I'm just going to continue attacking.
"The running is what I'm after. It's enjoyable."
'Surreal Scenario
In addition to the forward's 6 goals on debut, Ireland has netted eight in three appearances for Wythenshawe, while Boyd hit five on his debut match and Joleon Lescott, a defender by position, scored a hat-trick in one game up front.
The team are top of the Premier Division with 3 wins from three and a goal difference of +19.
Paul Barrow, thirty-eight, who features on the flank for Collegiate OB, came up against former Latics full-back Figueroa on Sunday - and had to tell his nine-year-old boy who Emile Heskey was.
He has appeared at 2 global tournaments for his country, in as well as playing in over two hundred top-flight matches.
"It was spreading like a rumor they had these ex-Premier League players," said the player.
"I felt I was a bit awestruck facing him to be honest.
"Also Heskey came on and he's got 60-odd England appearances.
"We competed well for a good twenty minutes but then we had a player dismissed and it was hard.
"We really haven't stopped talking about it - I was calling my mother and brother on the way home.
"The opponents were all really nice, shaking our hands after the game - it was like facing a bunch of regular guys.
"Now we can't wait for the second fixture."
'We'll Still Win the League'
Andy Kirby manages the opposition vets team, who secured the Premier Tier championship last season, along with his co-manager.
"Our team scored 1-0 up and had a