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How do you improve a stellar veteran squad who have claimed consecutive titles, featuring a double triumph with 30 wins from 32 matches?

Sign a group of former pro players that have performed at the top level of club football and international soccer as you aim for further trophies.

One Greater Manchester team fields an amateur veterans squad with nine former top-flight footballers in their active lineup.

222 Top Division Goals, 325 Global Appearances

Wythenshawe Veterans Over 35s are based in south the city and play in the Cheshire-based Veterans League Top Division.

Their squad list this season includes 9 ex- Premier League footballers, with a total over 1,800 elite appearances.

This high-profile roster also boasts over 220 top division goals and 325 international appearances.

They feature Papiss Cisse, who scored 37 scores in over 100 appearances for Newcastle United after joining them for £9m from German league club SC Freiburg in January 2012.

He had his first appearance for Wythenshawe in their most recent home-field match versus reigning champions their rivals and netted every one of the six scores in a 6-2 win - including a 32-minute first-half hat-trick.

Wythenshawe's roster for this season also includes ex- pros such as England and Anfield striker Emile Heskey, Hull City and Burnley FC midfielder George Boyd, Everton forward Oumar Niasse, Wigan defender Maynor Figueroa, City duo Stephen Ireland and Nedum Onuoha and Premier League title winners Joleon Lescott and Danny Drinkwater.

Collectively, the former Premier League players have claimed 15 big trophies and transferred for combined transfer fees of about £123 million.

Household Names and Global Players

Ireland began playing for the team in pre-season this season through good friend and present team player Blake Norton, and the former Irish player then asked additional ex-pros, who all compete in a weekly small-sided match, to participate.

Ex- Senegalese striker Niasse, who scored 12 scores in sixty-five top-flight matches for the Toffees and still attends their matches at Goodison Park, also made his debut versus the opposition - who are based in Liverpool and wear an Everton training kit as their strip.

"My mate Stephen told me 'join and play, it's a laugh'," commented the striker.

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

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

"Those people who come and see are pleased and to give someone's moment if they see us playing there and to ask us questions - it's really about the pleasure of us getting somewhere we can play, with organisation of course."

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

"That's a bit unusual but then, I love sprinting and just move inside - I'm not staying back that much," he said.

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

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

Unreal Scenario

Along with Cisse's six scores on debut, Ireland has scored eight in three appearances for the side, while Boyd hit 5 on his debut match and Joleon Lescott, a centre-half by position, notched a triple in one game up front.

Wythenshawe are top of the Premier Division with 3 wins from 3 and a GD of +19.

Paul Barrow, thirty-eight, who plays on the wing for Collegiate OB, faced former Wigan defender Figueroa on the weekend - and had to tell his young boy who Heskey was.

He has played at 2 World Cups for Honduras, in as well as featuring in over 200 top-flight matches.

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

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

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

"Our side held our own for a good 20 minutes but then we had a player dismissed and it was hard.

"We literally haven't ceased chatting about it - I was calling my mother and sibling on the way home.

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

"Now we are eager for the return match."

We Will Still Take the League'

Andy Kirby manages the opposition veterans team, who won the Top Tier title the previous campaign, along with his co-manager.

"We scored one-nil ahead and had a