🔗 Share this article Meet this Sunday Division Team Boasting Nearly Two Thousand English Top Division Appearances The substitutes for Wythenshawe Veterans during a six-two victory versus their opponents on 19 October (from left to right) - one player, another, a teammate, Blake Norton, Maynor Figueroa, Dean Warburton and Emile Heskey How can you boost a excellent veteran squad that have claimed back-to-back championships, including a double triumph with thirty victories from thirty-two games? Sign a group of former professionals who have competed at the highest level of club and international soccer as you aim for further honors. A Manchester club fields an amateur vets team with nine ex- top-flight players in their current lineup. 222 Premier League Goals, 325 International Appearances Wythenshawe Veterans Over 35s are situated in southern the city and play in the Cheshire-based Vets League Premier Division. Their squad list this season includes nine former Premier League footballers, with a total nearly 1,800 Premier League matches. The star-studded roster also boasts over 220 Premier League scores and over 320 global appearances. The squad include Papiss Cisse, who notched 37 goals in 117 appearances for his former club after moving to them for £9m from German league club Freiburg in January 2012. He made his first appearance for Wythenshawe in their most recent home match against reigning champions their rivals and scored all six goals in a six-two win - featuring a half-hour opening period triple. The roster for this season also features former pros such as England and Anfield forward Emile Heskey, Hull City and Burnley FC winger George Boyd, Everton striker Oumar Niasse, Wigan defender Maynor Figueroa, Manchester City pair Stephen Ireland and Nedum Onuoha and top-flight title victors Joleon Lescott and Danny Drinkwater. In total, the former top-flight footballers have claimed 15 major honors and transferred for combined transfer sums of approximately £123 million. Well-Known Figures and Global Players He earned six Irish caps, netting 4 goals Ireland started playing for the side in pre-season this summer through close mate and present Wythenshawe player Blake Norton, and the former Irish midfielder then invited additional ex-pros, who all play in a weekly nine-a-side match, to participate. Former Senegal forward Niasse, who scored 12 goals in 65 top-flight matches for the Toffees and still goes to their home games, also made his debut versus Collegiate OB - who are based in the city and wear an Everton warm-up gear as their uniform. Oumar Niasse featured for the club from 2016 and 2020 "A friend Stephen told me 'come and have a game, it's good fun'," said Niasse. "After that he told me we were playing a team from Liverpool and the shock I had when I saw them sporting Everton kits - I thought this is strange for me! "If you still love football and you feel you can still play, anywhere you can kick a ball, what are you going to do? "The fans who come and see are pleased and to make someone's moment if they see us competing there and to ask us questions - it's really about the joy of us having somewhere we can enjoy football, with organisation of course." Such is the bench strength at Wythenshawe, Niasse had his first game at full-back. "It's a little different but then, I love running and just go inside - I'm not defending that much," he said. "I warn my defender 'I'm not staying' and that I'm just going to continue attacking. "That running is what I'm after. It's good fun." Former Wigan full-back Maynor Figueroa is turning out for Wythenshawe Unreal Experience Along with Cisse's six goals on debut, Stephen Ireland has scored 8 in 3 appearances for Wythenshawe, while Boyd hit five on his debut appearance and Joleon Lescott, a centre-half by position, notched a hat-trick in one match up front. Wythenshawe are top of the Top Tier with 3 victories from 3 and a goal difference of plus nineteen. Paul Barrow, 38, who features on the flank for Collegiate OB, came up against former Latics defender Figueroa on Sunday - and had to explain his nine-year-old boy who Heskey was. He has appeared at two World Cups for Honduras, in as well as playing in more than two hundred Premier League games. "It was going round like wildfire they had all these ex-Premier League stars," said the player. "I felt I was a bit awestruck facing him to be honest. "Also Heskey got on and he's has 60-odd English caps. "We competed well for a solid twenty mins but then we had a player dismissed and it was tough. "Our group literally have not stopped talking about it - I was phoning my mum and brother on the way home. "The opponents were all friendly, shaking our hands after the game - it was like playing a group of regular guys. "Now we can't wait for the second fixture." We Will Still Take the Title' Andy Kirby manages the Collegiate veterans team, who won the Premier Division championship the previous campaign, along with his co-manager. "We went 1-0 up and had a