Following Voss's sudden axing on Tuesday afternoon, speculation was rife the Lions had headhunted Fitzroy old boy and Sydney Swans premiership coach Roos.
There was a belief they wanted to quickly join the race for his services with Melbourne.
Despite calling Roos six weeks ago to canvass his interest, Lions chairman Angus Johnson said on Thursday his availability played absolutely no role in Voss's departure.
Roos has consistently said, as recently as Wednesday, that at this stage he is not interested in returning to coaching.
"His availability or non-availability played absolutely no role in the decision making process with Michael Voss," Johnson said.
"I know there's been comment contrary to that, but I was in the board meeting, I was heavily involved in the process, and there was absolutely no way in the world we were going to make a decision on Michael Voss on the belief we could appoint Paul Roos to be senior coach, when he's said on more than one occasion that he's not interested in coaching.
"When (CEO) Malcolm (Holmes) spoke to him he made it abundantly clear that he wasn't interested.
"I hear what he says, but I'm going to ignore him and we are going to contact him."
Regretful Voss bows out with style
The Lions board will meet next Wednesday to finalise the process for finding a new coach, including a selection committee and proposed timeframe.
Johnson said they had a shortlist of candidates, some of who were still to be contacted.
On Wednesday he said the board felt Voss had taken the Lions as far as he could in his five-year tenure and it was time for a "fresh approach".
However, that fresh approach does not exclude senior assistant coaches with no proven record of success at the top level.
"If you're a senior experienced assistant coach, then you can't make that judgement call on their win-loss record," Johnson said.
"Clearly if we identify a senior coach we believe has a successful track record of taking teams into the top four, then obviously that'll tick a box, it'll tick a few boxes, but it's not the only criteria."
AFL.com.au believes interim coach Mark Harvey is not interested in the senior job on a full-time basis.
His fellow assistant coaches, including Shane Woewodin, Adrian Fletcher and Murray Davis, all have contracts that expire at season's end.
Twitter: AFL_mikewhiting
