THE curses of Scottish football are sectarianism, lack of talent, lack of money and the fact that football’s authorities in this country are singularly inept.

The real curse of Scottish football, however, is short-termism. The thought came to me last week when Aberdeen scraped through to the next qualifying round of the Europa League with St Johnstone and Rangers already out.

It used to be the joke that the only Scots left in Europe after Christmas are referees, but these days the date might well be August, for Aberdeen are no certainties to progress past Apollon Limassol of Cyprus and while I expect Celtic to deal with Rosenborg of Norway, there is no way I would put the mortgage on them making the group stages.

Celtic and Aberdeen deserve to go through to the group stages of the Champions League and Europa League respectively because of all the clubs in Scotland, they have taken a long-term approach to success.

By bringing in Derek McInnes and his team of coaches and by finding the resources to give McInnes a chance to prosper, Stewart Milne has put in the building blocks of the success that Aberdeen have enjoyed and will continue to savour – don’t forget, no Celtic and the Dons would have won the treble last season.

Celtic’s long-term planning has been even better, stretching all the way back to when Martin O’Neill was allowed to spend serious money and the club then cut back and prospered by finding new young talent worldwide and developing players to be sold on for massive profits.

What about the rest? Let’s start with the outfit that has raised the short-term view to an art form – Rangers. Pedro Caixinha has been promised time to develop his squad, and I’m afraid that is just nonsense.

Will chairman Dave King and his fellow directors continue to pump in money in the form of loans to keep Rangers afloat if they have to endure the barracking of fans as Pedro’s imports struggle to beat lesser sides, never mind Celtic?

Having said that, I have a great deal of sympathy for the Rangers fans who, lest it be forgotten, really saved their team – note, not club – from death.

This is going to be very controversial, especially given the demands by the fans of other clubs that the Scottish Football Association should strip Rangers of the titles they won while using the tax avoidance system, but I believe that the punishment given to Rangers at the time of administration in 2012 was the wrong one.

There is no doubt that when oldco Rangers went into liquidation, at that point the football authorities should have either declared that the team playing at Ibrox was a completely new entity and nothing to do with Rangers founded in 1872, or they should have made it clear that Rangers was a continuing entity from the day of administration.

The punishment applied in the latter case should have been a very hefty fine of, say, £10 million to be paid over two or three years. Rangers should also have been automatically relegated down one league and that would have meant that they could have kept their top Scottish players and be in a position to find more.

For there is no doubt that the Scotland national team has suffered as a result of Rangers being sent down to the fourth tier of Scottish football to start again.

Imagine a huge fine paid by Rangers being invested in bringing on Scottish talent. The eventual deal cobbled together by the Scottish Football League and Rangers with the connivance of the SFA did not take the long-term view of what is good for football in this country.

The SFA has been trying for years now to get a proper coaching system running in this country. In Brazil, Germany, and France, young talents are spotted before children are out of primary school and they are put through a tried and tested system which means that in the long term the best young talent gets the best training and makes it to the top.

There is no equivalent system in Scotland as yet and too much early development of talent is left to amateurs who can ruin a child’s prospects long before that kid ever sees a proper club.

Football could learn a lesson from Scottish athletics where investment in talent at a young age has proven spectacularly successful as we shall see you at the World Athletics Championships in London next week with so many Scots involved – all three of Team GB’s men’s 1500 m runners are Scottish. That did not happen by accident, but as a result of deliberate planning and perceptive analysis of how athletics in Scotland could be developed.

I am no great fan of the Scottish Rugby Union, but they do seem to be getting it right with a considerable number of young players coming through at the moment. Again that was because someone at Murrayfield took a long-term view of the situation and decided to put investment into youth I am glad to see that Amateur Boxing Scotland is having the success of its long-term planning confirmed, and I expect at least two or three graduates from the amateur ranks to start winning world professional titles within the next two years.

Some of the credit for all of this must go to sportscotland, who have encouraged long-term views to be taken in numerous sports. Football, please copy.