Darren Sutton’s journey from Under 18 All Australian to Las Vegas stripper

Not all footy young guns go on to star at the top level. Darren Sutton ended up stripping in front of Britney Spears in Las Vegas. But he has no regrets over his dashed footy dreams.

Darren Sutton from All Australian to stripper

Last time Darren Sutton featured in the news in 2017, the United States talkshows came calling.

“The Maury Povich show was ringing me non-stop – they were going to fly me from Melbourne to New York and pay my whole way.”

He turned them down, but let’s face it, “Daz” has got to be the only junior footy star to find himself taking his clothes off for hordes of screaming fans around the world, including Britney Spears at the height of her fame.

But 25 years ago, if you’d asked the then 18-year-old Mt Scopus student what the next decades would hold for him, Sutton would have pitched for a long AFL football career.

Darren Sutton was a junior star coming from Ajax Amateurs to Prahran Dragons in the TAC Cup.

READ MORE: 1998 UNDER 18 ALL-AUSTRALIAN TEAM, WHERE ARE THEY NOW?

Back in 1998, Sutton was a rover at the Prahran Dragons under the legendary Ray “Slug” Jordon – and on the cusp of Vic Metro selection.

“I got a late call-up into the squad and I played beautifully, I think I kicked six or seven (goals) from on-ball in a trial game and bang – from the squad – I made the Vic Metro team.”

From there, Sutton’s next step was Adelaide and the National Championships, where he found himself rooming with Brendan Fevola.

And a starring role with the dominant Vic Metro saw Sutton selected in the All-Australian team. He had his sights firmly set on getting drafted. But it wasn’t to be.

“I was short and I was a smart footballer, but in that era they were looking for (Anthony) Koutoufides types,” Sutton said. “I believe now – in this day and age – they’re going back to footballers, but back then they were after athletes.”

He did spend a year at Collingwood in 1999, but didn’t last long.

Darren Sutton (bottom) with his fellow Strip Search winners in 2003.

“I’ve gone from an All-Australian to a supp (supplementary) list, where your locker is in the toilet, you’re the last person picked, you’re a top-up player,” Sutton said.

“I thought ‘forget about it, I can’t be bothered with this’.”

With his footy career over, Sutton joined his Dad’s accounting firm – for one day, at least.

“I got there at 9.30am in a tracksuit top instead of a suit, and at 10am I said ‘Dad, just let me go and get a coffee and a bit of breakfast’,” Sutton recalled. “(But) I got on the No. 8 tram, went home and never went back.”

And that’s when the bright lights of television came calling, in the shape of one of Australia’s earliest reality TV experiments, Channel 9’s Strip Search.

“I gave them a call, sent them a few pics, had a bit of a dance in my lounge room,” Sutton said, and then he promptly forgot all about it.

But he got through to the show and danced his way into the six-man Manpower crew.

“It (Strip Search) was on Sunday at 5pm 10 episodes. It rated through the roof,” Sutton said.

“(Manpower) did double shows at Crown every Friday and Saturday night in front of 1500 girls for six weeks straight, just off the back of a TV show. It blew my mind.

“My mum even came to the show. I couldn’t believe it, going from a footballer who thought he was going to get drafted to a five-minute accountancy career and then performing in front of 1500 girls at The Palms at Crown.”

Sutton left his footy career behind decades ago, although he did pull on the boots for the first time since that ill-fated stint on the Collingwood supplementary list in a legends game for Melbourne amateur club Ajax last year.

And he sees a few of his old footy mates every now and again.

“I still see a few of the old Collingwood guys – if I run into (Nathan) Buckley I always have a chat with him,” he said.

And his 1998 Vic Metro roommate? “If I saw (Brendan) Fevola I’d have a chat with him, but I don’t think I’ve seen him for 20 years – I just hear him on the radio.”

After a decade performing on stage as one of the most popular shows in Las Vegas (‘I don’t think any of my stories are fit for the newspaper’), Sutton came home to Melbourne.

These days, the self-described Benjamin Button is the owner of the Playlounge and Playzone “adult playground” venues in Melbourne, with one about to open on the Gold Coast.

“It’s like one big frat party,” Sutton said, with axe-throwing, bull-riding and mud-wrestling.

Does he regret he never got his chance to live out an AFL dream like so many of his that All Australian U18 teammates? “I think it was fortunate; from where I sit today I wouldn’t swap my career for anything,” he said.