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How do you improve a stellar veteran side that have secured consecutive championships, including a double triumph boasting 30 wins from 32 games?

Recruit a collection of former pro players who have competed at the top level of club and global soccer as you target additional honors.

One Greater Manchester side has an amateur veterans squad with 9 ex- top-flight footballers in their current roster.

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

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

Their roster this season includes nine former top-flight footballers, with a total over 1,800 Premier League appearances.

This high-profile squad also boasts over 220 Premier League goals and over 320 international caps.

The squad include Papiss Cisse, who notched 37 goals in over 100 appearances for Newcastle United after joining them for £9m from Bundesliga side Freiburg in January 2012.

Cisse had his first appearance for the team in their most recent home game against defending champions their rivals and netted every one of the six scores in a 6-2 victory - including a half-hour first-half hat-trick.

The squad for this campaign also features former professionals such as English and Anfield forward Emile Heskey, Hull and Burnley FC winger George Boyd, Everton forward Oumar Niasse, Wigan defender Maynor Figueroa, City duo Stephen Ireland and Nedum Onuoha and top-flight title winners Joleon Lescott and Danny Drinkwater.

Collectively, the former top-flight footballers have won fifteen major honors and transferred for combined transfer sums of about £123 million.

Household Figures and Global Players

Ireland began playing for the team in preseason this summer through good mate and present team teammate Blake Norton, and the ex- Republic of Ireland player then asked other ex-pros, who all compete in a midweek small-sided match, to join in.

Former Senegal striker Niasse, who netted twelve goals in 65 top-flight games for Everton and still 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 strip.

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

"After that he informed me we were facing a side from Liverpool and the surprise I had when I saw them sporting Blue kits - I thought this is wrong for me!

"If you still enjoy football and you feel you can still play, anywhere you can kick a ball, what are you going to choose?

"Those fans who come and see are happy and to make someone's moment if they see us playing there and to ask us questions - it's more like the joy of us having somewhere we can enjoy football, with organisation of course."

So great is the bench strength at the club, he made his debut at full-back.

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

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

"The movement is what I'm looking for. It's enjoyable."

'Surreal Scenario

Along with the forward's six goals on his first game, Stephen Ireland has netted eight in 3 appearances for Wythenshawe, while Boyd scored 5 on his debut appearance and Lescott, a defender by trade, scored a triple in one match up front.

Wythenshawe are leading of the Top Tier with 3 victories from 3 and a goal difference of +19.

One opponent, thirty-eight, who plays on the wing for Collegiate OB, faced ex- Latics full-back Maynor Figueroa on the weekend - and had to tell his nine-year-old son who Emile Heskey was.

He has appeared at two World Cups for his country, in addition to featuring in over two hundred top-flight matches.

"It was going round like wildfire they had these former top-flight stars," said the player.

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

"Even Heskey came on and he's has over 60 England appearances.

"Our side held our own for a solid twenty minutes but then we had a player sent off and it was hard.

"We literally have not stopped talking about it - I was phoning my mother and brother on the way home.

"They were all dead sound, shaking our hands after the match - it was like facing a group of regular fellas.

"Now we are eager for the return match."

We Will Still Win the Title'

Andy Kirby coaches the Collegiate vets team, who won the Premier Tier title the previous campaign, along with his co-manager.

"We went one-nil ahead and had a