Introduce the Sunday Division Club Featuring 1,800 Top-Flight Appearances
How do you improve a stellar experienced side that have claimed consecutive championships, featuring a double triumph boasting thirty wins from thirty-two games?
Recruit a raft of former professionals that have competed at the highest tier of club and international soccer as you pursue further trophies.
A Manchester club has an amateur vets team with 9 ex- top-flight footballers in their present squad.
222 Top Division Scores, Three Hundred Twenty-Five Global Caps
Wythenshawe Vets Over 35s are located in southern Manchester and compete in the Cheshire-based Vets League Top Tier.
Their lineup this season features 9 ex- top-flight footballers, with a total 1,801 top-flight games.
The elite roster also boasts 222 top division goals and 325 international appearances.
The squad include Papiss Cisse, who netted thirty-seven scores in over 100 appearances for his former club after joining them for £9m from German league club SC Freiburg in January 2012.
He made his debut for Wythenshawe in their last home-field match versus defending champions their rivals and scored every one of the six scores in a six-two victory - featuring a half-hour first-half triple.
The team for this season also includes ex- pros such as England and Anfield striker Emile Heskey, Hull City and Burnley winger George Boyd, Everton striker Oumar Niasse, Wigan defender Maynor Figueroa, City pair Stephen Ireland and Nedum Onuoha and Premier League championship winners Joleon Lescott and Danny Drinkwater.
Collectively, the former Premier League players have secured fifteen major honors and transferred for total transfer fees of around £123m.
Famous Figures and International Players
Ireland started playing for the side during pre-season this summer through good mate and current team teammate Blake Norton, and the ex- Irish player then invited other ex-pros, who all play in a midweek small-sided game, to join in.
Ex- Senegal forward Oumar Niasse, who netted 12 goals in 65 top-flight games for the Toffees and even now attends their home games, also had his debut against the opposition - who are located in Liverpool and wear an Everton warm-up gear as their strip.
"A friend Stephen Ireland said 'join and have a game, it's good fun'," commented Niasse.
"Then he told me we were facing a side from Liverpool and the shock I had when I noticed them wearing Blue shirts - I thought this is wrong for me!
"When you still enjoy the game and you feel you can still play, wherever you can kick a ball, what are you going to do?
"The people who come and watch are happy and to give a day if they watch us competing there and to ask us questions - it's more like the pleasure of us having a place we can enjoy football, with organisation of course."
Such is the squad depth at the club, he had his debut at full-back.
"That's a little unusual but then, I enjoy running and just move inside - I'm not staying back that much," he said.
"I warn my centre-back 'I'm not hanging back' and that I'm just going to keep attacking.
"That movement is what I'm seeking. It's enjoyable."
Unreal Feeling
In addition to the forward's six scores on debut, Stephen Ireland has scored 8 in 3 games for the side, while George Boyd hit 5 on his first appearance and Joleon Lescott, a centre-half by position, notched a triple in one game as a striker.
Wythenshawe are top of the Premier Tier with 3 wins from three and a goal difference of +19.
One opponent, 38, who features on the wing for the opposition, faced former Wigan defender Maynor Figueroa on the weekend - and had to tell his young boy who Emile Heskey was.
Figueroa has appeared at 2 World Cups for his country, in as well as playing in more than two hundred Premier League games.
"The news was spreading like wildfire they had these former top-flight stars," remarked Barrow.
"I felt I was a little starstruck playing against him to be honest.
"Even Emile [Heskey] got on and he's has over 60 English caps.
"We competed well for a good 20 mins but then we had a man sent off and it was tough.
"We really have not ceased talking about it - I was phoning my mother and brother on the journey home.
"They were all dead sound, shaking our hands after the game - it was like facing a bunch of normal fellas.
"Now we are eager for the second match."
'We'll Still Take the Title'
Andy Kirby manages the opposition vets team, who won the Premier Tier championship the previous campaign, along with his co-manager.
"Our team went 1-0 up and had a