IF YOU are good enough for a role, you should be given that job regardless of your skin colour or gender. While this is rare in society, it is extremely rare in the world of sport.

You only have to look at the continued debate in football surrounding the Rooney Rule as an example of trying to get more ethnic minorities in coaching roles.

But there is still an alarming lack of female coaches, not just in the Premier League and the rest of football but in the National Basketball Association (NBA) and the National Football League (NFL).

Even in women’s sports, men are often the managers and coaches. Manager of England, male. While Mark Sampson is doing an excellent job, could you imagine Mo Marley or Hope Powell given Roy Hodgson’s job?

Supporters would be up in arms and while there is no viable male candidate to replace Hodgson, there is no way the Football Association would look at a woman.

Where am I going with this? I came across Becky Hammon while browsing through the Twitterverse last week.

It is not every day that a woman leads a male team to a trophy but that’s exactly what Hammon did last week.

Last year she became the NBA’s first female full-time assistant coach. I have to admit, the news totally escaped my radar due to the fact that the Spurs made little fuss about the hiring, like it was a regular thing. But it isn’t.

It is, and was, huge news and the Spurs should have made a bigger deal about the fact they had brought her on board, especially given what head coach Gregg Popovich had to say about her.

“She knows her stuff,” he said last year. “She’s competitive. I don’t know if her perspective is unique. It’s women instead of men but it’s the same game. Becky knows what to do on a pick-and-roll just as much as what Tony Parker knows, so I don’t think it’s unique at all.”

And her players love her. In a short time she managed to get the whole team on board with her principles and Spurs player Jonathon Simmons was full of praise for her.

“It’s amazing,” he said. “It was a humbling experience for all of us. I really love her and I’ve only known her a couple days.”

How many coaches can inspire a group of players like that in such a short space of time?

Look at what LA Lakers executive vice president Jeanie Buss — one of the highest-ranking female executives in sports — said and her success becomes even more significant.

“I think she has the ability to be a head coach in the NBA but there are only 30 such jobs and it is extremely competitive to get one no matter if you are male or female.

“If that is her desire I encourage her to follow that path. Being a woman is not a reason to stop. Continue doing outstanding work and the opportunity will come.”

This isn’t a comment on getting as many female coaches into sport just because of their gender. But there are talented women out there doing a superb job but are getting overlooked for roles by people who are afraid of change.

Why hire Powell or Marley when you can bring in Harry Redknapp and Joe Jordan? Two coaches who get chance after chance despite limited success in a CV full of failure.

It may be harsh to pick out Redknapp but I could have picked countless other coaches in football who seem to constantly get linked with jobs regardless of how badly they do in their previous role.

I remember growing up watching US TV shows and seeing Lisa Leslie, the Women’s National Basketball Association (WNBA) superstar.

Not every player moves into coaching once they retire but Leslie would have been a great addition to an NBA locker room, male or female.

But my problem is that as always, the Premier League is 100 years behind everyone else.

Lydia Bedford has been hired by non-league club St Neots as their under-21 manager which is fantastic news. Should she continue to do well, I would love to see her take over full-time responsibilities of the men’s side.

Helena Costa became the first female manager in French football — and Europe — when she took over Ligue 2 side Clermont Foot.

Though she only stayed in the job for 49 days because of awful treatment by the board, they replaced her with Corinne Diacre who has remained in charge ever since.

Other countries and sports are embracing the role of women coaching, slowly but surely. So why is England’s biggest league stuck in the stone age? Part of the reason is that the dinosaurs upstairs are still in charge and the sooner they leave the better.

I am in no way saying that the moment they leave there will be a huge influx of female and ethnic minority coaches.

But there will be more chance of there being a shift in focus in terms of hirings.

Popovich put things into perspective perfectly when he said: “I think a female coaching a team these days has got a lot to do with the people on the teams maturing as individuals, as members of a society understanding that it’s not about any of those things. It’s about talent. It’s about respect.

“And I think people like Becky, over time, gain respect and people understand that this is possible, it can happen.

“Just like women getting the vote. How many years did that take? It’s ridiculous when you think about how many decades and centuries in some cases [it took] before change was made.”

Change is on its way, let’s just hope it isn’t a slow drawn-out process.