Mick Malthouse has been sacked as Carlton coach after what Blues president Mark LoGiudice described as "a loss of trust between the club and coach".
The sacking came hours after Malthouse gave an incendiary radio interview where he slammed the board and CEO Steven Trigg.
Blues assistant coach John Barker will replace Malthouse on an interim basis for the remainder of the 2015 AFL season.
"John will nurture our younger players and our senior talent and give them a chance to shine," said LoGiudice.
The other Blues assistants, including Malthouse's longtime confidant Robert Wiley, will remain in their current positions.
Carlton will appoint an independent committee to find Malthouse's fulltime successor.
LoGiudice announced on Monday that a decision on Malthouse's future would be made within a fortnight - a position rubbished by the coach on Tuesday morning.
He said the two-week time-frame was pointless, effectively daring the club to dump him, which they duly did.
"I'm disappointed that last night we were aligned and this morning we were not," said LoGiudice.
"We're very disappointed but life puts up challenges," the club president added.
"It would have been great to have Mick coach out the year.
"I don't know about (feeling) angry. At the end of the day everyone chooses to live life they way the want."
LoGiudice denied the bottom-placed Blues were in crisis.
"As I communicated to Mick and our members yesterday, a decision on our senior coaching role was to be reviewed, considered and delivered in the week of the bye," LoGiudice told reporters.
"However, unfortunately Mick's obvious public disappointment with the football club has resulted in a loss of trust between the club and their coach.
"The board today considered the situation had deteriorated to such an extent that by not making a change now would only exacerbate our current position.
"We must be united in assessing where we presently are and where we want to go. "Without unity, we simply won't get there.
"I must stress that we do not accept that 2015 is a write-off."
The Blues currently sit in last spot on the ladder with just one win from eight matches. Malthouse holds the record for most VFL/AFL games coached, having been at the helm at Footscray, West Coast, Collingwood and Carlton for 718 games.
He overtook Collingwood legend Jock McHale earlier this year. "If people can judge me after 30 years, what's two more weeks mean? That I lose it totally or gain more knowledge about it?" he told Radio SEN on Tuesday morning.
"There's not a lot to gain by two weeks is there?
"I don't really get it - if you don't know about the person now, what does two weeks show?" Malthouse lamented that the coach was always the first to be sacrificed when boards needed to relieve pressure.
"Good boards stay sound. Boards crack under pressure, and the first thing that goes is the coach because it relieves a bit of the pressure," the veteran coach said.
"They beat their chest because they've made a decision, and they move on. "Very few of them ever work."
Malthouse said he knew it would be an uphill battle to keep his job after the pair who brought him in - former chief executive Greg Swann and ex-president Stephen Kernahan - left the club last year.
But he was certain he had the backing of his players, some of whom he said felt alienated and "hung out on a limb" by the Blues' mandate to rebuild its playing list.
"The day that I think the players aren't responding ... if that is the case that's when you do stop coaching." Barker's first match at the helm will be against Sydney at the SCG on Friday night.
