Meet this Weekend League Club Featuring Nearly Two Thousand Top-Flight Appearances

Wythenshawe Vets bench during a match
The bench for Wythenshawe Veterans in a 6-2 win versus their opponents on 19 October (from left to right) - one player, Papiss Cisse, Marcel Edwards, Blake Norton, Maynor Figueroa, Dean Warburton and Emile Heskey

How can you enhance a stellar experienced team that have claimed consecutive titles, featuring a league-cup double boasting 30 victories from 32 matches?

Sign a raft of former pro players who have performed at the highest level of club football and global football as you aim for additional silverware.

One Manchester side fields an amateur veterans team with 9 ex- Premier League footballers in their current roster.

222 Top Division Goals, Three Hundred Twenty-Five Global Appearances

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

Their squad list this season features 9 ex- top-flight players, with a total nearly 1,800 Premier League games.

The high-profile team also boasts 222 top division scores and over 320 international caps.

The squad include Papiss Cisse, who netted thirty-seven scores in 117 games for his former club after joining them for Β£9m from Bundesliga club SC Freiburg in January 2012.

He made his first appearance for the team in their last home-field match against defending title holders Collegiate Old Boys and netted all six goals in a six-two victory - featuring a half-hour first-half triple.

The squad for this campaign also includes former pros such as England and Anfield striker Emile Heskey, Hull and Burnley FC midfielder George Boyd, Toffees forward Oumar Niasse, Wigan Athletic defender Maynor Figueroa, Manchester City duo Stephen Ireland and Nedum Onuoha and top-flight title victors Joleon Lescott and Danny Drinkwater.

Together, the former Premier League footballers have won fifteen big honors and transferred for total transfer sums of approximately Β£123m.

Famous Names and Global Stars

Stephen Ireland in action
Stephen Ireland earned 6 Irish appearances, netting 4 goals

Stephen Ireland started turning out for the team in preseason this season through good mate and current Wythenshawe player Blake Norton, and the former Irish player then invited other ex-pros, who all compete in a midweek small-sided match, to join in.

Ex- Senegalese striker Niasse, who netted twelve goals in sixty-five top-flight games for Everton and still goes to their home games, also had his debut versus Collegiate OB - who are based in Liverpool and wear an Everton warm-up gear as their uniform.

Oumar Niasse playing for Everton
He played for Everton from 2016 and 2020

"A mate Stephen told me 'join and have a game, it's good fun'," commented the striker.

"After that he told me we were facing a side from Liverpool and the shock I had when I noticed them wearing Everton shirts - I say this is wrong for me!

"When you still love football and you feel you can still do it, wherever you can kick a ball, what are you going to choose?

"Those people who come and watch are pleased and to give a day if they see us competing there and to pose us queries - it's really about the pleasure of us having somewhere we can enjoy football, with structure of course."

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

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

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

"The movement is what I'm seeking. It's good fun."

Maynor Figueroa in action
Former Wigan defender Maynor Figueroa is playing for Wythenshawe

Dreamlike' Experience

Along with Cisse's six goals on debut, Stephen Ireland has netted 8 in three games for Wythenshawe, while George Boyd hit 5 on his first match and Lescott, a centre-half by position, scored a triple in one game up front.

Wythenshawe are leading of the Premier Tier with 3 wins from 3 and a GD of plus nineteen.

Paul Barrow, thirty-eight, who plays on the flank for the opposition, came up against ex- Wigan full-back Maynor Figueroa on Sunday - and had to tell his nine-year-old son who Heskey was.

Figueroa has appeared at 2 global tournaments for Honduras, in addition to featuring in more than 200 Premier League matches.

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

"I felt I was a little starstruck playing against him to be honest.

"Even Emile [Heskey] came on and he's got over 60 England caps.

"We held our own for a good twenty mins but then we had a man sent off and it was hard.

"Our group really have not ceased chatting about it - I was calling my mother and brother on the journey home.

"The opponents were all really nice, shaking our hands after the match - it was like playing a bunch of regular guys.

"Now we are eager for the second fixture."

We Will Still Take the Title'

Andy Kirby coaches the Collegiate veterans team, who won the Premier Division title the previous campaign, along with Paul Maguire.

"We went 1-0 ahead and had a

Maria Cabrera
Maria Cabrera

Elara Vance is a tech journalist and former software engineer who simplifies complex tech topics for a broad audience.