Michael Voss insists he is “at peace” with his decision to step down as Carlton coach just nine rounds into the season revealing his departure was inevitable.

The 50-year-old, speaking for the first time since the news broke, has outlined the timeline of his decision and confirmed talks were initiated before the club’s clash against the Lions last weekend.

With the club 1-8 this season and enduring just as many issues off the field as on, Voss stepped down from his role after 103 matches in charge.

“At peace with it,” he told the AFL.com.au when asked how he was feeling. “I’ve had a few days to think about it. There’s one thing knowing it and another thing doing it.

“We had had a chat on Friday, I’d been feeling that it was time. Why that conversation was important is that I didn’t want the result (against Lions) to be the emotional response to change my mind.

“I was hoping for a miracle on grass too…I didn’t want the game to sweep me up in emotion.

“I was getting to a point where the decision had to be made. It got activated pretty quick.”

Voss said he was more than aware of what was being written about his future and the speculation surrounding his role at the club.

“I asked for their (board) support,” he continued.

“It was on shaky ground and the inevitable was becoming clearer, but the fighter and competitor in you wants to take things as far as you can.

“It just feels right.”

It was somewhat poetic that Voss’s final match in charge was against his former club with whom he won multiple Premierships.

“It was nostalgic,” he said of finishing up in Queensland. “It just landed on that day.

“Coming into that day I knew this was the last game. After the game you’re saying your last goodbyes without anyone really knowing was my last game. That’s not my style.”

Amid the weight of pressure, drama and speculation, Voss appears to have escaped without too much damage given the chaos surrounding the Blues this season.

“What I can’t explain is that a lot of the last nine weeks has not impacted me,” he said. I’m fine until they check in.

“How you show up is on you. I’ve never wanted to hand my emotions to somebody else. We determine how we show up. What someone says about me shouldn’t alter my approach.

“You have to compartmentalise the role you play in football.”

While it may not have ended the way he wanted, Voss believes that he has left the club in a better place, particularly Carlton's culture.

“I invested a lot of time in that,” Voss explained.

“To me, coaching is one thing about X’s and O's, but it’s also about relationships, it’s also about conversations and having lots of them and being present for them whenever they need you and trying to provide that environment where they can come to and love being there and love getting better.

“I mean, the core essence of high performance is getting better every single day. That is the absolute core of it.

“I think if you can feel like you’re growing as an individual and you’re getting better, you can’t help but want more, and you want more and more.

“If we’ve provided that environment…and I feel like we have. When you watch us train, you see what we’re trying to do.

“We’ve had to learn that skill; it hasn’t just arrived, and that’s what I think the players will walk away with.

“They should have complete confidence that there is a high performance in there that will get the best out of them, there’s a great group of coaches that will be there for them and coach them hard and keep them accountable for what they want to do.

“They’re well supported right through our medical and wellbeing, and where we think about the person first and not just the player.

“That’s taken an enormous amount of work; it was not like that when I walked in.

“So that takes an enormous amount of work to get to that point in time, and now it’s about how do you leverage it.

The three-time premiership captain then doubled down on this belief.

“I can guarantee you that it is a better place than when I walked in there,” he declared.

“It’s like comparing solos versus alignment, they're just two different things.

“No accountability to full accountability, I mean, that’s just a completely different place.

“Sub-standard training standards to elite training standards. The frustration within all of that is that the actual measure that we clearly like to tick over is the W (wins).

“And we hadn’t been able to transfer that enough.”

Nick Austin departs from Carlton

On the same day as Michael Voss resigns from Carlton, the club has been dealt a second blow in the following hours.

It's been reported by AFL Media's Riley Beveridge that Carlton's list manager Nick Austin has stepped aside from his position.

Austin had been list manager of the side since 2020.

What the board said:

It was time for change.

The simple message Carlton CEO Graham Wright repeated as he and members of the club board faced the media following news that Michael Voss had stepped down from his role at head coach.

With the club 1-8 this season and enduring just as many issues off the field as on, Voss stepped down form his role after 103 matches in charge.

The news was met by an outpouring of support and well wishing from the AFL fraternity with SEN's Kane Cornes congratulating Voss on walking away while Gerard Whateley took aim at the Blues saying they had set their man up to fail.

"We're one and eight. The reality of the position that we find ourselves in, as Rob's alluded to as well, is that it was time for a change," Wright said.

“One thing with Michael is he’s incredibly diligent, and he’s hardworking, he’s a great leader … whether we were a good enough team at the end, whether we had enough talent and that will be something we look at going forward into the future as well.

“When we came into the year we didn’t base it just on win-loss, and we’re not sitting here today saying it’s just win-loss, did we improve in the things we wanted to, we probably hadn’t made the leaps we would’ve liked to there.

“I think he had a decent-enough runway.”

Wright's position on the matter was echoed by Carlton President Rob Priestly who added: "We need a circuit-breaker to move forward.

"Michael (Voss) acknowledges now is the right time to move forward under the leadership of a new senior coach.

“He came into Chris on Friday and said ‘I think with all the speculation about my role it’s the right time’, we were debating timing – whether it was into the bye or whatever it is, but he came in and said ‘I think it’s the right time to clear the air, give the club the right opportunity to move forward and focus on the future’.

“He resigned, so the decision is mutual today, but we had been talking about all those areas we need to improve on and that had been a very transparent conversation.

Asked if recent drama with Elijah Hollands had played any role in the decision, Priestly added: "What happened around Elijah was finalised from an AFL perspective last week and certainly didn't have anything to do with this."

The club confirmed that had given Voss the opportunity to speak alongside them in the press conference but it is understood he will conduct his own interview later today (Tuesday).

Voss's final message to Blues players

GM of Football Chris Davies was asked how the 50-year-old was holding up.

"Michael was in a very reflective mood earlier on and he spoke incredibly well to players and staff," he said.

"He was still urging the players to be better. It was an important message he gave. As someone that has been involved and supported the club for a long time, he wants it to be successful."

Following the resignation of Voss, Wright has also confirmed that the club would ‘attack’ the draft in the coming years.

“I think we're going to attack the draft,” Wright said.

“We've been really open with that. But over the next two to three years or we've probably started it before now with the last two years.

“So, we'll certainly go to the draft again this year. This is the last uncompromised draft before Tassie comes in.

“We've got two picks in this year's draft.

"Whether we get to keep both of those depending on what happens with Cody (Walker), but we'd also like to have more picks in this year's draft, and we've got two in the next year's as well, so that'll be the way we'll attack it. And there's no ceiling on these things.”

Cripps: I was shocked (by Voss' resignation)

Carlton captain Patrick Cripps admitted he was shocked by Michael Voss’ decision to resign as coach.

Speaking after the press conference featuring Graham Wright, Rob Priestley, and Graham Wright, the two-time Brownlow Medallist addressed some of the media, saying he was caught off guard by the announcement.

“I was shocked. Like it's early in the year,” Cripps admitted.

“I think everyone that's watched footy this year, in terms of, I suppose, the attention around him and the way he's handled himself, I just couldn't speak highly enough of a person who, through a lot of adversity, showed up so well as a leader for us as players.

“So yeah, I didn't think it was going to happen like this. So shock is one way (to describe it).”

Cripps also expressed gratitude to his former coach.

“It's pretty emotional,” he said.

I suppose from my end, (it’s) a lot of gratitude towards him and what he did for this footy club over four years.

“So as a captain, I couldn't speak highly enough of (him).”

With Cripps’ contract finishing in 2027, there has been plenty of speculation as to whether he would stay at the club as they rebuild.

However, the captain gave a straightforward answer, saying that he would continue to give his all for the club this season.

“I'm contracted to next year,” he added.

“I'm really committed in terms of this season. I'm not just going to wave the white flag and waste the year.

“There's a lot for me to play out this year. The privilege to play AFL is a massive honour.

“There are so many people in the world that would love to play any game of footy, and that never gets lost to me, especially for this footy club.

“I'm going to lead it the same way, I've been doing it, for the last sort of six to eight years, and you know where the jump with pride and keep going for it.”

Listen to the full emergency Fireball podcast on Voss below: