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How do you improve a stellar veteran team who have claimed consecutive titles, featuring a league-cup double boasting thirty wins from thirty-two games?

Recruit a raft of ex- professionals who have competed at the elite tier of club and global football as you target further silverware.

One Manchester team has an amateur vets team with 9 ex- top-flight players in their active lineup.

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

Wythenshawe Veterans Over 35s are based in south Manchester and compete in the Cheshire Vets League Premier Division.

The roster this campaign includes nine ex- Premier League players, with a collective 1,801 elite games.

This elite roster also boasts 222 top division goals and 325 global appearances.

The squad include Papiss Cisse, who netted 37 scores in over 100 games for Newcastle United after signing for them for £9m from German league side SC Freiburg in January 2012.

Cisse had his debut for Wythenshawe in their last home game versus reigning champions their rivals and netted all six scores in a 6-2 victory - featuring a 32-minute first-half triple.

The team for this campaign also includes ex- pros such as England and Liverpool forward Emile Heskey, Hull City and Burnley FC midfielder George Boyd, Everton striker Oumar Niasse, Wigan Athletic full-back Maynor Figueroa, Manchester City pair Stephen Ireland and Nedum Onuoha and Premier League title winners Joleon Lescott and Danny Drinkwater.

Collectively, the ex- top-flight footballers have won fifteen significant trophies and moved for total transfer fees of about £123 million.

Well-Known Figures and International Stars

Stephen Ireland started playing for the team in preseason this summer through good mate and current Wythenshawe teammate Blake Norton, and the ex- Irish player then asked other former professionals, who all compete in a midweek nine-a-side match, to join in.

Ex- Senegal forward Oumar Niasse, who netted twelve goals in 65 Premier League games for Everton and even now goes to their home games, also had his debut against Collegiate OB - who are based in Liverpool and use an Everton training kit as their strip.

"A mate Stephen said 'join and have a game, it's a laugh'," commented Niasse.

"After that he told me we were facing a team from Liverpool and the shock I had when I saw them sporting Everton kits - I thought this is wrong for me!

"If you still enjoy the game and you feel you can still do it, wherever you can play, what are you going to do?

"The people who turn up and see are happy and to make a moment if they see us playing there and to pose us questions - it's really about the pleasure of us having somewhere we can play, with organisation of course."

So great is the strength in depth at the club, he had his first game at defender.

"It's a little different but then, I love running and just move inside - I'm not defending that much," he added.

"I warn my centre-back 'I'm not hanging back' and that I'm just going to continue running.

"That movement is what I'm after. It's enjoyable."

'Surreal Experience

In addition to the forward's 6 goals on debut, Ireland has scored eight in 3 games for Wythenshawe, while George Boyd scored five on his first match and Joleon Lescott, a defender by trade, scored a hat-trick in one match up front.

Wythenshawe are leading of the Top Tier with three wins from 3 and a GD of +19.

Paul Barrow, thirty-eight, who features on the wing for the opposition, faced ex- Wigan full-back Maynor Figueroa on Sunday - and had to explain his young boy who Heskey was.

Figueroa has appeared at 2 World Cups for his country, in as well as playing in more than 200 Premier League matches.

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

"I think I was a little awestruck playing against him to be honest.

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

"Our side competed well for a good 20 minutes but then we had a man dismissed and it was hard.

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

"They were all really nice, shaking our hands after the game - it was like facing a group of regular fellas.

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

'We'll Still Win the Title'

The manager coaches the opposition veterans side, who secured the Top Division title last season, along with Paul Maguire.

"Our team scored 1-0 up and had a