Leeann Dempster, the Hibernian chief executive, believes a woman will be managing a top Scottish club within five years – and says she would not be averse to her own club taking the jump first.

Dempster is confident it is only a matter of time before a female manager is appointed at a men’s club in one of the top leagues in the country.

“There absolutely will be progress in the coming years,” she said. “The reason it’s slow at the moment is because a lot of the women have recently been or still are playing in the game. But now, they’re coming to the end of the playing careers and they’re doing their coaching badges so I think you will find that more women will be involved in the elite men’s game, no doubt about it.”

Hibs have led the way in appointing women to some of the top positions at the club; not only is Dempster one of the few female CEOs in men’s football in Britain, the club also has two further female board members.

As with all posts in her club, Dempster says she would not show any favouritism towards women but she believes the right candidate could enter the highest levels of the men’s game.

“It would have to be the right person for the job,” she said. “They [a female coach] might have to work at smaller clubs to gain experience but that’s no different to anyone else. So I wouldn’t be surprised if you saw a female coach in a leading men’s team in the reasonably short-term - the next five years or something like that.”

Having just secured promotion to the Premiership, Hibs manager Neil Lennon is unlikely to be going anywhere in the foreseeable future but Dempster would not restrict herself to solely male candidates were she looking to appoint a manager in the future.

“In the years to come, if I’m still at Hibernian and we’re looking for a head coach and the right person comes at the right time then I would be [happy to employ a female coach],” she said. “I think you’ll see it sooner rather than later and I don’t have any issues with being first, second, third, whatever – it all comes down to employing the right person at the right time and so I really hope to see women coaches coming through.”

Earlier this month, it was announced that Shelley Kerr who, in 2014, became the first woman to manage a senior men’s team in Britain, would become the next manager of the Scotland women’s team leaving the number of women managing men’s sides at zero.