Glen Bartlett reveals why he’s stepping down as Melbourne president

Glen Bartlett shocked Melbourne when he announced he’d be stepping down as president. He reveals why he made the call.

Glen Bartlett with coach Simon Goodwin. Picture: Getty

Departing Melbourne president Glen Bartlett is adamant he left the role on his own terms, saying it was time to give back to his family and fiance after eight years in the role.

And while Bartlett admits he bruised some egos over his withering assessment of last year’s loss to Port Adelaide he says he had no regrets over calling out the playing group.

Bartlett told the Herald Sun on Monday despite the unusual timing of his Round 4 exit he was simply “cooked” after a brutal COVID period had taken a toll.

Vice-president Kate Roffey will take over, with Bartlett revealing he had even been in discussions about extending his tenure before a change of heart that coincided with the end of the AFLW season.

He did not travel to Canberra for the Round 3 win over Greater Western Sydney and instead spent the night on the couch at home with some of his four sons.

“We were having a couple of Furphys (beers) and halfway through the game Adam said to me, ‘Do you realise this is the first time we have done this since you have been president eight years ago?’,” Bartlett said.

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Glen Bartlett with coach Simon Goodwin. Picture: Getty

“I literally started to tear up. My fiance Victoria and I were engaged in 2017 and it’s 2021 and we aren’t married yet. It had become all-consuming. It hit me then. This is the best time to leave.

“The team is flying, we have people in all the right spots, we have the fourth-best balance sheet in the AFL and it’s bitten into my time with my sons and hobbies.

“On so many levels, I just thought, ‘I am cooked’.”

Bartlett said it had been a demanding role across the past 14 months.

“With COVID, board meetings became weekly, I have got three businesses, four sons in their 20s and three of them with serious partners, my fiance Vicki and I had been thinking about when was the right time,” he said.

“We had a really good person in Kate Roffey who I had brought onto the board and we need more women in administration and across the club and it just sent the right message at every level.”

Bartlett said while board discussions remained confidential, he had gone out in his own time frame and was not pushed in any way.

Bartlett has been Melbourne’s president since 2013.

“In terms of boardroom discussions I never talk outside the boardroom but I chose the time, I chose to go,” he said.

“It really requires so much of you and there will always be stuff swirl and rumours.

“But I just kept saying, ‘Why not now?’ If you are done, you are done and people need to respect that.”

After the club’s horror loss to Port Adelaide last year Bartlett told the Herald Sun in an extraordinary interview the Demons had been “disgraceful” and “insipid”, saying: “When you pull on a Melbourne jumper, we don’t give them out in Weeties packets”.

He said of that self-described “rant”: “No regrets. One thing I will say is that I am a values-based leader. I tried to drive standards and Patrick Smith nicknamed me The Stickler.

“No doubt I trod on toes but I have always tried to be respectful in the way I delivered standards and I don’t make apologies for stepping on people’s toes.

“It’s about our club and I go really strong on that and if people don’t like it, it’s just tough luck. I will never apologise for that.

“If you don’t stand for nothing, what do you stand for. So yeah, people can get a bit bruised and there were some rumblings on that, but I couldn’t care less. Toughen up.”