Meet the Sunday Division Squad With Over 1,800 Top-Flight Matches

Wythenshawe Vets bench during a match
This substitutes for the team Vets during a 6-2 victory against their opponents on 19 October (left to right) - one player, Papiss Cisse, Marcel Edwards, Blake Norton, Maynor Figueroa, Dean Warburton and Emile Heskey

How can you enhance a stellar experienced squad who have won back-to-back championships, including a league-cup double boasting 30 victories from 32 games?

Sign a group of ex- pro players who have played at the top level of club football and international soccer as you pursue additional silverware.

A Greater Manchester side fields an amateur vets team with nine ex- top-flight players in their present squad.

222 Top Division Scores, 325 Global Appearances

Wythenshawe Vets Over 35s are situated in south the city and compete in the Cheshire-based Vets League Top Division.

Their roster this campaign boasts 9 former Premier League footballers, with a combined over 1,800 top-flight matches.

The star-studded roster also includes 222 top division goals and over 320 global appearances.

The squad include one forward, who scored 37 scores in 117 games for his former club after joining them for nine million pounds from German league club SC Freiburg in January 2012.

He made his debut for Wythenshawe in their most recent home match against defending title holders their rivals and scored all six scores in a 6-2 victory - including a half-hour first-half hat-trick.

The roster for this season also includes former professionals such as English and Liverpool forward Emile Heskey, Hull and Burnley FC winger George Boyd, Toffees striker Oumar Niasse, Wigan Athletic defender Maynor Figueroa, City duo Stephen Ireland and Nedum Onuoha and top-flight title winners Joleon Lescott and Danny Drinkwater.

In total, the former top-flight footballers have claimed 15 significant honors and transferred for combined transfer fees of about £123m.

Household Names and International Players

Stephen Ireland in action
He won six Republic of Ireland appearances, netting 4 scores

Ireland started turning out for the team in preseason this summer through good friend and present team player Blake Norton, and the former Irish player then invited additional former professionals, who all play in a weekly nine-a-side match, to participate.

Former Senegalese forward Oumar Niasse, who scored twelve goals in sixty-five top-flight matches for the Toffees and still attends their matches at Goodison Park, also made his first appearance against Collegiate OB - who are located in Liverpool and wear an Blue warm-up gear as their strip.

Oumar Niasse playing for Everton
Oumar Niasse featured for Everton between 2016 and 2020

"My mate Stephen said 'come and play, it's a laugh'," said the striker.

"Then he informed me we were playing a side from Liverpool and the shock I had when I saw them sporting Everton shirts - I thought this is wrong for me!

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

"Those spectators who turn up and see are happy and to make a day if they see us playing there and to pose us questions - it's more like the joy of us having somewhere we can play, with structure of course."

So great is the bench strength at Wythenshawe, he had his first game at full-back.

"That's a little different but then, I enjoy running and just go forward - I'm not defending that much," he said.

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

"The movement is what I'm after. It's good fun."

Maynor Figueroa in action
Former Wigan Athletic full-back Maynor Figueroa is turning out for Wythenshawe

'Surreal Scenario

Along with Cisse's 6 goals on debut, Ireland has scored 8 in three appearances for the side, while George Boyd hit five on his debut match and Lescott, a centre-half by position, notched a triple in one game as a striker.

The team are top of the Top Division with three wins from 3 and a GD of plus nineteen.

Paul Barrow, 38, who plays on the flank for Collegiate OB, came up against ex- Wigan defender Maynor Figueroa on Sunday - and had to tell his young boy who Heskey was.

He has appeared at two global tournaments for Honduras, in as well as playing in more than two hundred Premier League matches.

"It was going round like a rumor they had all these former top-flight players," said the player.

"I felt I was a little starstruck playing against him to be honest.

"Also Heskey came on and he's has over 60 English caps.

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

"We really have not stopped talking about it - I was phoning my mum and brother on the journey home.

"The opponents were all friendly, shaking our hands after the match - it was like facing a group of normal fellas.

"Now we are eager for the return fixture."

We Will Still Take the League'

Andy Kirby manages the Collegiate vets side, who won the Top Division championship the previous campaign, together with his co-manager.

"We went one-nil ahead and had a

James Fisher
James Fisher

A data scientist and tech writer passionate about demystifying AI and emerging technologies through accessible, in-depth content.