Darren Beckford was once Norwich's record signing when he joined the club for £925,000 from Port Vale in June 1991. A graduate of Manchester City's youth team (see also Mike Sheron,Ashley Ward), he made eleven appearances for the Maine Road side before spending loan periods at Bury (12 games, 5 goals) and Port Vale (11 games, 4 goals). Moving to Vale Park on a permanent basis, he accumulated 167 league appearances for the Valiants scoring 68 times. This resulted in the attention of the Canaries but his spell at Carrow Road was not successful and Darren only scored 13 times in 49 appearances.

A transfer to Oldham in March 1993 saw him play 52 times for Oldham scoring 11 times before being released in the summer of 1996. He has since spent time at Scottish side Hearts, Second Division Preston North End and Third Division Fulham before moving to Walsall just before transfer deadline day in March 1997. In September 1997, he joined Vauxhall Conference side Rushden & Diamonds. This move was unsuccessful and Darren moved onto Southport making just one substitute appearance. On 7th November 1997, the Eastern Daily Press reported that Darren had joined Total Network Solutions Llansantffraid of the League of Wales for an undisclosed fee Darren's trawl through non-league football came to an end in December 1997 when he was alleged to have rejoined Bury. The following year saw him join non-league minnows Bacup Borough.

Darren also began working for the Princes Trust working with youngsters in Manchester. In September 1998, he won a successful industrial tribunal case against the trust for being racially victimised. He is now working as an attendance officer at "Claremont Primary School" in Moss Side, Manchester.