🔗 Share this article Meet the Weekend League Squad Boasting 1,800 Top-Flight Matches The bench for the team Vets in a 6-2 victory against their opponents on 19 October (from left to right) - one player, Papiss Cisse, a teammate, Blake Norton, Maynor Figueroa, Dean Warburton and Emile Heskey How can you boost a outstanding veteran side that have claimed consecutive championships, including a double triumph with 30 victories from 32 games? Sign a collection of former pro players who have performed at the highest tier of club football and global soccer as you target more silverware. One Manchester team has an amateur vets team with nine ex- top-flight players in their active roster. Two Hundred Twenty-Two Premier League Scores, 325 Global Appearances Wythenshawe Veterans Over 35s are situated in southern the city and compete in the Cheshire-based Veterans League Top Division. Their lineup this season includes 9 former Premier League players, with a collective nearly 1,800 top-flight games. This star-studded team also includes 222 Premier League goals and 325 international caps. The squad include Papiss Cisse, who scored 37 goals in over 100 appearances for his former club after moving to them for £9m from German league club Freiburg in 2012. Cisse made his first appearance for the team in their most recent home-field match against reigning title holders Collegiate Old Boys and netted all six scores in a six-two win - featuring a half-hour first-half hat-trick. The squad for this campaign also includes former professionals such as English and Anfield forward Emile Heskey, Hull and Burnley FC winger George Boyd, Everton forward Oumar Niasse, Wigan Athletic defender Maynor Figueroa, City duo Stephen Ireland and Nedum Onuoha and top-flight title victors Joleon Lescott and Danny Drinkwater. Collectively, the former top-flight players have secured fifteen major trophies and moved for combined transfer sums of about £123 million. Household Figures and International Stars He earned 6 Irish caps, scoring four scores Ireland started turning out for the side during preseason this season through close friend and present team teammate Blake Norton, and the ex- Irish midfielder then asked other ex-pros, who all compete in a weekly small-sided match, to participate. Former Senegalese striker Oumar Niasse, who netted 12 scores in sixty-five top-flight matches for Everton and still goes to their home games, also made his first appearance against Collegiate OB - who are based in Liverpool and use an Everton warm-up gear as their strip. Oumar Niasse played for Everton between 2016 and 2020 "A mate Stephen told me 'join and have a game, it's good fun'," said the striker. "Then he informed me we were facing a team from the city and the surprise I had when I noticed them wearing Blue kits - I thought this is strange for me! "If you still love the game and you know you can still do it, anywhere you can play, what are you going to do? "Those fans who come and see are happy and to give a day if they see us playing there and to ask us questions - it's more like the joy of us getting somewhere we can enjoy football, with organisation of course." Such is the squad depth at Wythenshawe, he had his first game at full-back. "That's a bit unusual but then, I love sprinting and just go forward - 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 keep running. "That movement is what I'm looking for. It's good fun." Former Wigan Athletic defender Maynor Figueroa is playing for Wythenshawe 'Surreal Feeling Along with the forward's 6 goals on debut, Ireland has scored eight in 3 appearances for the side, while Boyd hit 5 on his debut match and Lescott, a defender by position, scored a hat-trick in one game as a striker. Wythenshawe are leading of the Premier Tier with three victories from 3 and a GD of +19. Paul Barrow, thirty-eight, who features on the flank for Collegiate OB, faced ex- Latics full-back Maynor Figueroa on the weekend - and had to tell his young son who Heskey was. He has appeared at two global tournaments for Honduras, in as well as featuring in more than 200 top-flight matches. "The news was going round like a rumor they had all these ex-Premier League players," remarked the player. "I felt I was a bit awestruck facing Figueroa to be honest. "Even Heskey came on and he's has over 60 England appearances. "Our side held our own for a solid 20 minutes but then we had a player dismissed and it was tough. "Our group literally haven't ceased chatting about it - I was phoning my mum and brother on the way home. "The opponents were all dead sound, shaking our hands after the match - it was like facing a bunch of regular guys. "Now we can't wait for the second fixture." 'We'll Still Win the Title' The manager coaches the opposition veterans team, who won the Top Tier title last season, together with his co-manager. "Our team scored one-nil up and had a