Dancing With The Stars viewers slam Ben Cousins' appearance on season premiere

By Marta Jary For Daily Mail Australia 13:37 07 Jul 2024, updated 13:54 07 Jul 2024

• READ MORE: Ben Cousins reveals relationship status after years of being on the market as footy great announces huge move 

Ben Cousins is making a career comeback with his appearance on reality television as a contestant on Dancing With The Stars. 

The former AFL player debuted on the show on Sunday night, but viewers had mixed feelings about seeing the fallen star back on TV screens.

Several shared their thoughts on X, with some uncomfortable that Ben, 46, is being given another chance given his difficult past. 

'Oh great, now time for their forced Ben Cousins redemption,' complained one person on the social media platform. 

'How many second chances does Ben Cousins get? He must know dirt on a lot of people,' another said. 

Someone else chimed in: 'Seeing Ben Cousins on the platform doesn't sit right with me.'

'Just putting it out there that I am very uncomfortable with Ben and Ant [Middleton] in this cast. I'm not here for their redemption arc,' one more wrote.  

'Ben Cousins looks like he's about to poop the whole routine,' one more joked. 

Others were happy to see the former footballer have a go, with one person posting: 'At least Ben did some decent steps. Cute.'

'Loved the Foxtrot. Well done Ben and Siobhan,' wrote another person tuning in at home. 

Ben has been rebuilding his life in recent years after a fall from grace. 

He won the Brownlow Medal in 2005 and captained the West Coast Eagles from 2001 to 2005, securing the club's best and fairest awards four out of those season. 

He played 238 games and booted 205 goals for the West Coast Eagles, where he won a premiership with the club in 2006. 

His dramatic fall from grace was well documented from 2007 as he publicly battled a drug addiction and coped with his failed relationship with Maylea Tinecheff.

He was later sacked and copped a one year ban from the AFL for repeated infringements.

In 2021, Susan Backshell, who has acted as a mentor for Cousins since his last stint on jail, told Daily Mail Australia that he remains solely focused on his kids.

Sitting in a cold, cramped jail cell for the sixth time in 13 years, Cousins decided enough was enough after seven months behind bars in 2020.

He told her he wanted to make amends and clean up his life and Backshell gave him an ultimatum: 'Give it his all, or forget it entirely'.

Since Cousins was released from custody back in December 2020, Backshell said she's never once questioned his commitment to sobriety and bettering his community.

It comes after Ben revealed that his time filming Dancing With The Stars has reignited his passion for sport. 

The star says he missed the rush of competition and couldn't get enough.

'I love the lifestyle of a professional athlete and I missed it,' he told the Herald Sun. 

'I really thought that I was going to get six to eight, or 10 weeks through the experience and I'd just be hanging on for dear life waiting for the days to finish. But it was the complete opposite.'

Ben went on to say that he did not want the experience to end.  

'I remember being one week before the show wrapping up and I was starting to get sad, I didn't want to go home,' he said. 

'For me to think back to that it still shocks me that that could have been the case. I fell in love with it, it was incredible'.