🔗 Share this article

How can you improve a outstanding experienced team who have claimed back-to-back titles, including a league-cup double with 30 victories from thirty-two games?

Sign a raft of former professionals that have played at the highest level of club football and international soccer as you aim for more silverware.

One Greater Manchester team has an amateur vets team with nine former top-flight footballers in their active squad.

222 Premier League Scores, 325 International Appearances

The team Vets Over 35s are located in southern Manchester and play in the Cheshire Vets League Top Tier.

Their squad list this campaign boasts nine former Premier League players, with a collective over 1,800 top-flight matches.

The high-profile roster also boasts over 220 top division scores and over 320 global caps.

They feature one forward, who notched 37 goals in 117 games for his former club after signing for them for nine million pounds from Bundesliga side SC Freiburg in January 2012.

Cisse made his debut for the team in their most recent home game versus defending champions their rivals and scored all six scores in a six-two win - including a half-hour first-half triple.

The squad for this season also includes ex- professionals such as England and Anfield striker Emile Heskey, Hull City and Burnley winger George Boyd, Everton forward Oumar Niasse, Wigan Athletic full-back Maynor Figueroa, City pair Stephen Ireland and Nedum Onuoha and Premier League championship winners Joleon Lescott and Danny Drinkwater.

Together, the ex- Premier League players have secured fifteen big honors and transferred for total transfer sums of approximately £123m.

Household Names and Global Stars

Ireland began playing for the team in preseason this summer through close mate and current Wythenshawe teammate Blake Norton, and the former Irish midfielder then asked additional ex-pros, who all play in a weekly small-sided match, to participate.

Former Senegal forward Niasse, who netted 12 goals in 65 top-flight games for the Toffees and even now goes to their home games, also made his first appearance versus the opposition - who are based in Liverpool and wear an Blue warm-up gear as their uniform.

"My mate Stephen Ireland told me 'join and play, it's a laugh'," said the striker.

"After that he informed me we were playing a team from the city and the shock I had when I saw them sporting Blue shirts - I thought this is wrong for me!

"If you still enjoy football and you know you can still play, wherever you can play, what are you going to do?

"The spectators who come and watch are happy and to give a day if they see us playing there and to ask us queries - it's really about the pleasure of us getting a place we can play, with structure of course."

Such is the strength in depth at the club, Niasse had his first game at full-back.

"That's a bit unusual but then, I enjoy sprinting and just go inside - I'm not staying back that much," he said.

"I tell my defender 'I'm not hanging back' and that I'm just going to continue attacking.

"That running is what I'm seeking. It's good fun."

'Surreal Scenario

In addition to Cisse's 6 goals on debut, Ireland has netted 8 in 3 games for the side, while Boyd scored five on his debut appearance and Lescott, a defender by position, scored a triple in one game up front.

The team are leading of the Top Tier with 3 wins from 3 and a GD of plus nineteen.

Paul Barrow, 38, who plays on the wing for Collegiate OB, faced ex- Latics full-back Figueroa on the weekend - and had to tell his young boy who Emile Heskey was.

Figueroa has played at 2 World Cups for Honduras, in addition to featuring in over two hundred Premier League games.

"The news was going round like wildfire they had all these ex-Premier League stars," said the player.

"I think I was a bit awestruck playing against him to be honest.

"Also Emile [Heskey] got on and he's got over 60 England appearances.

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

"Our group literally haven't ceased talking about it - I was calling 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 regular fellas.

"Now we can't wait for the return fixture."

'We'll Still Win the Title'

The manager manages the opposition veterans side, who secured the Top Tier title last season, along with his co-manager.

"We went 1-0 up and had a