A FORTNIGHT ago John Sutton played in public for the first time in 13 months when he took part in a parents v children match at his son’s school in Glasgow.

The 35-year-old target man had hung up his boots after helping St Mirren win the Championship two seasons ago, subsequently moving to Renfrewshire rivals Morton as their under-20 coach.

However, it took new manager David Hopkin just two days watching Sutton put the teenagers through their paces to realise he still had a future as a player and, after persuading him to sign on for 2019/20, he is hoping he can provide the goals and the nous to bring top-tier football back to Cappielow for the first time since 1985.

“I had quite a few offers to play for other clubs when I left St Mirren but, as far as I was concerned, I was finished with playing,” says Sutton, who is currently with Morton’s youngsters in Portugal. “However, the manager and David MacKinnon, the chief executive, had been watching me at training. They kept telling me how good I looked and said I should still be playing. Then they invited me to join in with the first-team lads for a few sessions and, after that, I was offered a one-year contract.

“My biggest worry is that I might now lose my coaching job! Derek Anderson, our head of youth development, is effectively my boss and he’d been asking me to play for his over-35s side, which he claims is better than Morton’s anyway.

“However, I’ll be able to train and play for the first team without it affecting the coaching, which I’m really enjoying.”

Sutton, though, had not been entirely inactive since relocating from Paisley to Greenock.

“I played for the dads against the kids at the Gaelic School in Finnieston recently. I just love playing football,” he said. “Last season I used to enjoy joining in practice matches and I’m looking forward to helping out the manager next season. Our squad is very young but he did well in sim-ilar circumstances with Livingston.”

Hopkin has long been an admirer of the striker.

“I tried to sign him for Livingston when he was at St Mirren but it didn’t work out,” he said. “I’m just delighted to have him now. John is one of a dying breed. There aren’t too many players left who know how to play that position. He and Lee Miller – who has just re-signed with Livi – are very sim-ilar, both have played at the highest level and John can do the same job for us as Lee did for me there.

“I could tell after watching him for a couple of days that he still had the fitness to play, which is a testament to how he looks after himself. Offering him a deal was a no-brainer for me.”

MacKinnon – the former Dundee, Partick Thistle, Rangers, Airdrie and Kilmarnock defender who also served as chief executive for Kilmarnock, Dundee and Hamilton – backs Hopkin’s judgment.

“He [Sutton] led from the front at training, out-running kids who are half his age and I just thought: ‘You should still be playing’,” he said. “Now he will be – and his second game back is the BetFred Cup tie at Motherwell, one of his former clubs. It’s also live on BT Sport so his big brother, Chris, will be commentating on his comeback.

“Anyway, I retired with Killie when I was 35 but was persuaded to come back by Forfar manager Paul Hegarty and I loved that extra year. I’ve told John he’ll be good for a min-imum of 10 goals next season.”