Eleni Glouftsis


Eleni Glouftsis is an Australian rules football field umpire in the Australian Football League. As of 27 June 2020, she has umpired in 31 AFL matches.
She is notable as the first female field umpire to officiate in a match sanctioned by the AFL, which occurred in the 2016 NAB Challenge match between the Carlton Football Club and Essendon Football Club, played on 28 February 2016 at Princes Park.
Glouftsis became the first woman to be appointed field umpire for an AFL home-and-away match, when she was selected to officiate the and match in round 9 of the 2017 AFL season. She was congratulated by Malcolm Turnbull, the Australian Prime Minister.
On 1 November 2018 Eleni was awarded the Young South Australian of 2019, in a ceremony at the Adelaide Oval.

Umpiring career

Glouftsis commenced umpiring in 2008 with the North Eastern Metro Junior Football Association in Adelaide, South Australia, before commencing to umpire in the South Australian National Football League, umpiring her first senior SANFL match in August 2013, being the first female to officiate as a field umpire in a SANFL match.
She then moved to Melbourne on a three-year AFL Female Pathway scholarship at the end of 2014, where she umpired in 12 Victorian Football League matches during the 2015 VFL season, umpiring her first VFL match in June of that year. Glouftsis was also added to the AFL umpires rookie list as a field umpire at the beginning of the 2015 season, and trained with a dedicated coach within the AFL umpires group.
After officiating in two intra-club matches in the 2016 AFL pre-season, involving St Kilda and Essendon, she was appointed to her first AFL sanctioned match after what were described as "strong performances" by the AFL's National Umpiring Director, Wayne Campbell.

Personal life

Outside of umpiring she is a physical education teacher at St. Bernard's College, Melbourne. Both her parents were football umpires, and her partner, Dillon Tee, is also an AFL boundary umpire. In July 2019 Tee proposed to Glouftsis in the middle of the Melbourne Cricket Ground after they had both umpired the round 19 match between Carlton and Adelaide.