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What do you improve a excellent veteran squad that have won consecutive championships, including a double triumph with thirty victories from thirty-two matches?

Bring in a group of former professionals who have played at the highest tier of club and international football as you aim for further honors.

A Greater Manchester team has an amateur vets team with nine ex- Premier League players in their current roster.

Two Hundred Twenty-Two Premier League Goals, 325 International Appearances

Wythenshawe Vets Over 35s are based in south the city and play in the Cheshire Vets League Top Division.

The squad list this campaign boasts nine former Premier League players, with a total 1,801 Premier League appearances.

This elite roster also boasts over 220 top division scores and over 320 international appearances.

They include Papiss Cisse, who scored 37 goals in over 100 appearances for his former club after signing for them for £9m from Bundesliga side Freiburg in 2012.

He had his first appearance for the team in their last home-field match against defending champions their rivals and scored all six scores in a six-two victory - featuring a 32-minute first-half hat-trick.

Wythenshawe's squad for this campaign also includes former professionals such as English and Liverpool forward Emile Heskey, Hull and Burnley FC winger George Boyd, Toffees forward Oumar Niasse, Wigan full-back Maynor Figueroa, Manchester City pair Stephen Ireland and Nedum Onuoha and top-flight title winners Joleon Lescott and Danny Drinkwater.

In total, the former top-flight players have won fifteen major trophies and moved for total transfer sums of approximately £123m.

Household Figures and International Players

Stephen Ireland began playing for the side during pre-season this summer through close friend and current team teammate Blake Norton, and the ex- Republic of Ireland midfielder then invited other former professionals, who all compete in a midweek small-sided game, to participate.

Ex- Senegal forward Niasse, who scored twelve scores in sixty-five top-flight matches for Everton and even now goes to their home games, also made his first appearance versus the opposition - who are based in the city and use an Blue training kit as their uniform.

"A friend Stephen Ireland told me 'come and have a game, it's good fun'," said the striker.

"After that he told me we were playing a team from the city and the surprise I had when I noticed them sporting Everton shirts - I thought this is strange for me!

"If you still enjoy football and you know you can still do it, wherever you can kick a ball, what are you going to do?

"The spectators who turn up and watch are pleased and to give someone's day if they watch us playing there and to ask us queries - it's really about the pleasure of us getting somewhere we can enjoy football, with structure of course."

So great is the squad depth at the club, he made his debut at defender.

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

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

"The running is what I'm after. It's enjoyable."

Unreal Scenario

Along with Cisse's six goals on debut, Ireland has scored eight in three games for Wythenshawe, while George Boyd scored five on his debut match and Joleon Lescott, a centre-half by position, scored a triple in one game up front.

The team are leading of the Premier Tier with 3 victories from 3 and a GD of +19.

Paul Barrow, 38, who features on the flank for the opposition, came up against former Latics defender Maynor Figueroa on the weekend - and had to explain his nine-year-old boy who Heskey was.

Figueroa has appeared at 2 global tournaments for Honduras, in addition to playing in more than two hundred Premier League matches.

"It was going round like a rumor they had all these former top-flight players," said the player.

"I think I was a bit awestruck facing Figueroa to be honest.

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

"Our side competed well for a solid twenty mins but then we had a man sent off and it was hard.

"Our group literally haven't ceased chatting about it - I was calling my mum and sibling on the journey home.

"They were all really nice, shaking our hands after the game - it was like playing a group of normal fellas.

"Now we are eager for the return fixture."

'We'll Still Take the League'

Andy Kirby coaches the opposition veterans side, who won the Premier Tier championship the previous campaign, along with his co-manager.

"Our team went one-nil ahead and had a