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How can you improve a stellar veteran team who have won consecutive titles, featuring a double triumph boasting thirty victories from thirty-two games?

Recruit a group of former pro players who have played at the elite tier of club and international football as you pursue further silverware.

A Manchester team has an amateur veterans team with 9 ex- top-flight footballers in their current squad.

Two Hundred Twenty-Two Premier League Goals, Three Hundred Twenty-Five International Appearances

The team Veterans Over-35s are situated in southern the city and compete in the Cheshire-based Vets League Premier Tier.

The lineup this season features 9 former top-flight footballers, with a combined 1,801 elite appearances.

The elite team also includes over 220 Premier League goals and over 320 international caps.

They feature Papiss Cisse, who notched 37 scores in over 100 appearances for his former club after moving to them for nine million pounds from German league club Freiburg in 2012.

Cisse had his first appearance for Wythenshawe in their last home match versus defending title holders Collegiate Old Boys and netted all six scores in a six-two victory - including a half-hour opening period triple.

The squad for this season also includes former pros such as English and Anfield striker Emile Heskey, Hull City and Burnley FC midfielder George Boyd, Everton striker Oumar Niasse, Wigan Athletic full-back Maynor Figueroa, Manchester City duo Stephen Ireland and Nedum Onuoha and Premier League title victors Joleon Lescott and Danny Drinkwater.

Together, the ex- top-flight footballers have won fifteen major honors and transferred for total transfer sums of around £123m.

Famous Figures and Global Players

Stephen Ireland started turning out for the team during preseason this season through close mate and present team teammate Blake Norton, and the ex- Irish midfielder then invited other ex-pros, who all compete in a weekly nine-a-side match, to join in.

Ex- Senegalese forward Niasse, who scored 12 goals in 65 Premier League matches for Everton and even now goes to their matches at Goodison Park, also had his debut versus the opposition - who are based in the city and use an Blue warm-up gear as their uniform.

"A friend Stephen said 'join and have a game, it's good fun'," commented Niasse.

"Then he informed me we were facing a team from the city and the surprise I had when I noticed them wearing Everton kits - I say this is strange for me!

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

"The spectators who turn up and see are pleased and to make a moment if they watch us playing there and to pose us questions - it's more like the pleasure of us having a place we can enjoy football, with organisation of course."

So great is the squad depth at the club, he had his debut at defender.

"That's a little different but then, I love running and just move forward - I'm not staying back that much," he added.

"I warn my defender 'I'm not staying' and that I'm just going to continue running.

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

Unreal Feeling

In addition to Cisse's six scores on his first game, Stephen Ireland has netted eight in 3 appearances for the side, while Boyd hit five on his first appearance and Lescott, a centre-half by position, notched a triple in one match up front.

The team are top of the Top Division with three victories from 3 and a GD of +19.

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

He has appeared at two World Cups for Honduras, in addition to playing in over two hundred Premier League games.

"It was going round like wildfire they had these ex-Premier League players," remarked the player.

"I felt I was a bit starstruck playing against Figueroa to be honest.

"Even Heskey got on and he's got 60-odd England appearances.

"We competed well for a solid 20 minutes but then we had a player sent off and it was hard.

"Our group literally have not ceased talking about it - I was calling my mum and brother on the way home.

"They were all dead sound, shaking our hands after the game - it was like facing a group of normal guys.

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

'We'll Still Take the Title'

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

"We scored 1-0 ahead and had a