Potential Carlton coach Mick Malthouse says he won’t be motivated by a sense of revenge against Collingwood if he takes up the vacant Blues job.

Malthouse coached Collingwood for 12 years, ending with the 2010 AFL premiership and 2011 grand final loss, before being replaced by Nathan Buckley under an agreement brokered two years in advance.

Malthouse, who is heavily favoured to replace the sacked Brett Ratten at Carlton, suggested that while he wasn’t technically sacked by the Magpies, in practical terms it amounted to the same thing.

“There’s different methodologies, not many coaches volunteer to go, the terminology is irrelevant,” Malthouse told the Seven Network on Saturday night.

But he said seeking to prove a point to the Collingwood hierarchy would not be the right motivation for coaching Carlton.

“The achievement is not through revenge, you’ve got to attack it another way,” he said.

Malthouse refused to commit to coaching the Blues, saying he still had the drive and energy but was considering the potential effect on his family.

“The family won’t decide whether I coach,” he said.

“It’s whether I will coach and the bearing it will have on them.

“Because I know I have and will get great support, but that’s the thing you weigh up.”

However, he rubbished comments by Magpies president Eddie McGuire, who this week said he feared coaching could end up killing Malthouse, such was its effect on his health when the Buckley hand-over deal was made in 2009.

“How ridiculous,” Malthouse said.

“There’ll be no tit-for-tat with Eddie. My health’s fine.

“I wouldn’t put anyone through anything if I didn’t think I could get through a season of football.”

Malthouse said one of the philosophies he lived by was that a person should not pass up an opportunity that would later leave them wondering: “Why didn’t I?”

When it was put to him that coaching the Blues might be such an opportunity, he said: “That may well be the case.”