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Merely a quarter of an hour after Celtic issued the news of Brendan Rodgers' surprising resignation via a brief short communication, the bombshell landed, from Dermot Desmond, with whiskers twitching in apparent anger.

Through an extensive statement, major shareholder Desmond eviscerated his old chum.

The man he convinced to join the club when Rangers were gaining ground in 2016 and required being in their place. And the figure he once more relied on after the previous manager left for another club in the summer of 2023.

So intense was the ferocity of his critique, the jaw-dropping comeback of the former boss was almost an after-thought.

Two decades after his departure from the organization, and after a large part of his latter years was dedicated to an continuous circuit of public speaking engagements and the performance of all his past successes at the team, Martin O'Neill is returned in the dugout.

Currently - and maybe for a time. Considering things he has said recently, he has been keen to get a new position. He will view this role as the ultimate chance, a gift from the Celtic Gods, a return to the environment where he enjoyed such success and adulation.

Will he relinquish it easily? It seems unlikely. Celtic could possibly make a call to sound out their ex-manager, but the new appointment will act as a balm for the time being.

'Full-blooded Attempt at Character Assassination

O'Neill's return - as surreal as it is - can be parked because the biggest shocking development was the harsh way Desmond wrote of Rodgers.

This constituted a full-blooded attempt at character assassination, a branding of Rodgers as deceitful, a perpetrator of untruths, a disseminator of falsehoods; divisive, deceptive and unacceptable. "A single person's wish for self-preservation at the expense of everyone else," stated he.

For a person who prizes decorum and sets high importance in dealings being done with confidentiality, if not outright privacy, here was another illustration of how abnormal things have become at the club.

The major figure, the club's dominant presence, operates in the margins. The absentee totem, the one with the authority to make all the major decisions he pleases without having the responsibility of justifying them in any public forum.

He does not attend team annual meetings, dispatching his son, his son, instead. He rarely, if ever, gives interviews about Celtic unless they're hagiographic in tone. And still, he's slow to speak out.

There have been instances on an occasion or two to defend the organization with confidential missives to news outlets, but nothing is made in the open.

It's exactly how he's preferred it to be. And that's exactly what he went against when launching all-out attack on Rodgers on Monday.

The directive from the team is that he resigned, but reading Desmond's invective, line by line, you have to wonder why he allow it to reach this far down the line?

If Rodgers is guilty of every one of the things that Desmond is claiming he's guilty of, then it's fair to inquire why was the manager not dismissed?

Desmond has charged him of distorting things in open forums that were inconsistent with the facts.

He says his statements "played a part to a hostile environment around the team and fuelled animosity towards members of the executive team and the board. A portion of the criticism aimed at them, and at their families, has been completely unwarranted and improper."

Such an extraordinary allegation, that is. Lawyers might be mobilising as we discuss.

His Ambition Conflicted with Celtic's Model Once More'

To return to happier days, they were close, Dermot and Brendan. Rodgers lauded Desmond at every turn, expressed gratitude to him whenever possible. Brendan deferred to him and, truly, to nobody else.

It was the figure who took the criticism when Rodgers' returned happened, post-Postecoglou.

It was the most divisive hiring, the return of the prodigal son for a few or, as some other supporters would have described it, the return of the shameless one, who departed in the lurch for Leicester.

The shareholder had Rodgers' support. Gradually, the manager employed the charm, delivered the victories and the trophies, and an fragile truce with the fans turned into a love-in again.

It was inevitable - consistently - going to be a point when his goals clashed with Celtic's business model, though.

This occurred in his first incarnation and it happened once more, with added intensity, recently. He publicly commented about the slow way the team went about their player acquisitions, the interminable delay for prospects to be landed, then missed, as was frequently the situation as far as he was believed.

Repeatedly he spoke about the necessity for what he called "agility" in the transfer window. Supporters concurred with him.

Despite the club spent record amounts of money in a twelve-month period on the expensive Arne Engels, the costly Adam Idah and the significant Auston Trusty - none of whom have cut it to date, with one already having departed - the manager demanded more and more and, often, he expressed this in public.

He set a controversy about a lack of cohesion inside the team and then distanced himself. Upon questioning about his comments at his subsequent media briefing he would usually downplay it and almost reverse what he said.

Internal issues? Not at all, everybody is aligned, he'd say. It looked like he was engaging in a risky strategy.

A few months back there was a report in a newspaper that purportedly came from a insider associated with the club. It said that the manager was harming the team with his public outbursts and that his true aim was managing his departure plan.

He desired not to be present and he was arranging his exit, that was the implication of the story.

The fans were angered. They now viewed him as akin to a martyr who might be carried out on his honor because his directors wouldn't back his plans to bring triumph.

The leak was poisonous, naturally, and it was intended to harm him, which it accomplished. He called for an inquiry and for the guilty person to be removed. If there was a examination then we heard nothing further about it.

At that point it was plain the manager was losing the backing of the people in charge.

The regular {gripes