Melissa Azzopardi

Melissa is the General Manager Finance at the Australian Football League.

Starting her career in ASX listed companies spanning across Insurance, FMCG and Energy, Melissa transitioned into Sports and Entertainment where she has had the opportunity to build her leadership and commercial capability while driving transformational change and partnering with the business to support the most successful sporting events in Australia.

Melissa stepped into her first CFO role at Tennis Australia in 2018 focused on setting a clear vision to transform the finance function and introduce capability to support the dynamic growth of the organization.

Melissa played a key role in risk management and scenario planning that would underpin the delivery of the Australian Open during a pandemic.

Melissa moved to the AFL in 2021 as GM Finance and would again be charged with leading transformation, overseeing the rebuild of the industry financials following the Covid-19 disruption.

Melissa’s most rewarding experiences have focused around the development and leadership of high performing finance teams and through planning and delivering transformational change which has enabled a culture of continuous improvement and true business partnering. This has created an empowering and rewarding environment as a financial professional in an industry that ignites so much excitement and passion from grass roots community participation through to the elite game of AFL.