Introduce the Sunday Division Club Featuring 1,800 Top-Flight Matches

Wythenshawe Vets bench during a match
This bench for the team Veterans during a six-two victory versus their opponents on October 19th (from left to right) - Oumar Niasse, another, Marcel Edwards, Blake Norton, Maynor Figueroa, Dean Warburton and Emile Heskey

What can you enhance a outstanding veteran team who have claimed consecutive titles, featuring a league-cup double boasting 30 wins from 32 games?

Sign a raft of ex- professionals who have competed at the highest tier of club and global football as you pursue more trophies.

A Manchester team boasts an amateur vets squad with 9 ex- top-flight players in their current roster.

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

The team Vets Over-35s are based in southern Manchester and play in the Cheshire-based Veterans League Premier Tier.

The lineup this season includes 9 ex- Premier League players, with a combined nearly 1,800 elite matches.

The star-studded team also contains over 220 Premier League scores and over 320 international caps.

They feature Papiss Cisse, who scored 37 scores in 117 games for Newcastle United after moving to them for nine million pounds from German league side SC Freiburg in 2012.

Cisse had his first appearance for the team in their most recent home-field game against reigning title holders their rivals and netted all six scores in a 6-2 win - including a half-hour opening period hat-trick.

Wythenshawe's roster for this season also includes ex- professionals such as England and Liverpool forward Emile Heskey, Hull City and Burnley FC midfielder George Boyd, Everton striker Oumar Niasse, Wigan defender Maynor Figueroa, Manchester City pair Stephen Ireland and Nedum Onuoha and top-flight championship victors Joleon Lescott and Danny Drinkwater.

Collectively, the former top-flight players have claimed fifteen big trophies and moved for total transfer fees of about £123 million.

Household Figures and Global Stars

Stephen Ireland in action
Stephen Ireland won six Irish appearances, netting 4 goals

Stephen Ireland started playing for the side during pre-season this season through close friend and present team teammate Blake Norton, and the former Irish midfielder then invited additional former professionals, who all play in a weekly small-sided game, to participate.

Ex- Senegal forward Niasse, who netted twelve goals in sixty-five top-flight matches for Everton and still attends their matches at Goodison Park, also had his debut against the opposition - who are located in Liverpool and wear an Everton training kit as their uniform.

Oumar Niasse playing for Everton
He played for the club between 2016 and 2020

"A mate Stephen Ireland said 'come and play, it's enjoyable'," commented Niasse.

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

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

"Those spectators who turn up and watch are pleased and to make a moment if they see us playing there and to ask us questions - it's more like the pleasure of us getting a place we can play, with structure of course."

So great is the strength in depth at Wythenshawe, Niasse had his first game at defender.

"It's a bit unusual but then, I enjoy running and just move forward - I'm not staying back that much," he said.

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

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

Maynor Figueroa in action
Former Wigan full-back Maynor Figueroa is playing for the team

Unreal Feeling

Along with the forward's 6 goals on his first game, Stephen Ireland has netted 8 in 3 appearances for Wythenshawe, while Boyd hit 5 on his first appearance and Lescott, a centre-half by trade, scored a triple in one game up front.

The team are top of the Top Division with 3 wins from three and a GD of plus nineteen.

Paul Barrow, thirty-eight, who plays on the flank for the opposition, came up against former Wigan defender Figueroa on the weekend - and had to explain his nine-year-old boy who Emile Heskey was.

He has appeared at two World Cups for his country, in addition to featuring in more than 200 Premier League matches.

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

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

"Also Heskey got on and he's has 60-odd English appearances.

"Our side held our own for a good twenty minutes but then we had a player dismissed and it was hard.

"We literally have not ceased chatting about it - I was calling my mum and sibling on the journey home.

"They were all dead sound, shaking our hands after the match - it was like facing a bunch of normal fellas.

"Now we are eager for the return match."

We Will Still Take the Title'

The manager coaches the Collegiate vets side, who won the Top Division championship the previous campaign, together with Paul Maguire.

"We went 1-0 up and had a

Katrina Nelson
Katrina Nelson

A seasoned business analyst and writer with over a decade of experience covering global markets and digital transformation.