Rob Priestley’s love of the Carlton Football Club is lifelong. That genuine empathy for the old dark Navy Blues can be sourced to the new President’s wide-eyed childhood years of the late 1960s - the revivalist years under Ron Barassi - when he first caught glimpse of men of stature like Nicholls, Jesaulenko, Crosswell and Quirk.

Rob’s links with Carlton can be sourced to his grandfather Clive and father Syd, both lifelong supporters, and the old family home ‘Ormsby’ at No.17 The Grove – a short Sydney Road tram trip from the ground in Moreland. The former Carlton footballer and recruiter Newton Chandler, who famously claimed to have first spotted the young Preston hopeful Bert Deacon through a knothole in the fence at City Oval, lived down the road at No.2.

This week, Rob, as the newly-appointed 32^nd President of the Carlton Football Club, shared his reminiscences from the first floor of the Carlton IN Business Lounge on the site of what was once the Robert Heatley Stand. The room commands stunning views of IKON Park, including Rob’s old vantage point on the terraces.

As a boy of eight or nine, Rob would enthusiastically follow Clive, Syd and his older brothers Steven and John to the place then known as Princes Park. There they’d find a vantage point between the Northey Stand and the pickets on the cemetery-side wing, just in time for the curtain raiser – and when ‘Big Nick’ broke the banner at five to two Master Priestley would straddle  a portable stool to watch the great man lead his heroes to greatness.

“Thinking back on it now, there was always a sense of expectation because of the way Carlton teams played,” Rob recalled. “We were really hard to beat, especially here, and our players were tough, amongst them Ronny Auchettl who my father loved. I can remember Cliffy Stewart from those games, my favourites were ‘Big Nick’ ‘ Jezza’, ‘Serge’, Bryan Quirk, Garry Crane, Ian Robertson, ‘Ragsy’ Goold and Wes Lofts.

“We went to every game at Carlton, but we also went everywhere else – Windy Hill, Kardinia Park, Glenferrie Oval and the Junction Oval where Fitzroy was playing at the time.

“If we won both the seconds and the seniors Dad would buy half a dozen jam donuts after the game, and as Carlton won more often than not I carried a bit more weight as a kid. But as soon as I got home I used to head out to the backyard to kick the footy for about an hour . . . they are really fond memories.”

As the years rolled on, the Carlton premierships came – eight in all, beginning with the drought-breaking Grand Final of 1968, taking in the Parkin era and ending with the all-conquering record breakers of ’95. Rob was at the MCG to see them all, and he is forever grateful for the sheer happiness the likes of Southby, McKay, Sheldon, Johnston, Hunter, Kernahan, Williams and Koutoufides brought him.

Asked to nominate the greatest of them all, Rob unhesitatingly declared the surreal Grand Final of 1970, when Barassi’s Blues famously turned a 44-point half-time deficit into a monumental ten-point victory over Bob Rose’s black and whites.

“I was nine years old in 1970, and can remember watching that Grand Final with my mother Mary and my brothers,” Rob said. “Peter McKenna was on fire for Collingwood and by half-time I was inconsolable and in tears.

“An old man standing nearby patted me on the back and said ‘Don’t worry son, it’s only a game of football’, but when we won I saw the old man crying, so I turned to him and said ‘Don’t worry old man, it’s only a game of football’."

Fast forward 55 years, to his elevation to the Carlton Presidency – and Rob is equally as passionate, for he knows the football club he is now entrusted to lead is in a good place both on and off the field – and as the chair of the financial institution JP Morgan Australia & New Zealand he knows better than anyone the importance of a values-based collaboration. 

“It’s a great privilege to have been asked to be President of this amazing Football Club, the Club I have followed my entire life,” Rob said.

“It’s really exciting, there’s no doubt about that. The Presidency of Carlton is something I will take very seriously, and I will do my utmost to continue to take this Football Club forward.”

Every Carlton-supporting member should take great comfort in the knowledge that in President Priestley the Club is in good hands – for the kid who cheered on ‘Big Nick and ‘Jezza’ truly understands the power of Carlton as a community-driven, successful entity capable of evoking joy in so many.

“In managing my professional life it’s never been about one individual but moreso the collective,” he insisted.

“Organisations are successful when everybody’s doing what they should be doing - they’re working together and partnering together, and culture is very important.

“Stability and unity is just so critical, not only in a football club, but in any organisation, because it’s very hard for people to do a good job if they’re looking over their shoulders. If people are happy with the environment they’re working in and can be laser-focused on what they’re trying to achieve then that’s when success comes about.

“And if I can make a contribution that makes a difference then I’d be very proud.”