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Merely fifteen minutes following the club issued the news of their manager's shock departure via a perfunctory short statement, the bombshell landed, courtesy of the major shareholder, with clear signs in obvious anger.

In an extensive statement, key investor Desmond savaged his old chum.

The man he persuaded to come to the team when their rivals were getting uppity in 2016 and needed putting in their place. Plus the man he again turned to after the previous manager departed to Tottenham in the summer of 2023.

Such was the ferocity of Desmond's critique, the astonishing comeback of Martin O'Neill was practically an secondary note.

Two decades after his departure from the organization, and after a large part of his latter years was dedicated to an continuous series of public speaking engagements and the playing of all his old hits at Celtic, Martin O'Neill is back in the dugout.

Currently - and maybe for a while. Considering things he has expressed lately, O'Neill has been keen to secure a new position. He'll see this one as the perfect opportunity, a present from the Celtic Gods, a return to the place where he enjoyed such success and adulation.

Will he relinquish it easily? It seems unlikely. The club could possibly reach out to contact Postecoglou, but the new appointment will act as a soothing presence for the moment.

All-out Attempt at Character Assassination

O'Neill's reappearance - as surreal as it is - can be parked because the biggest 'wow!' moment was the brutal manner Desmond described the former manager.

This constituted a full-blooded endeavor at defamation, a branding of Rodgers as deceitful, a perpetrator of untruths, a disseminator of falsehoods; divisive, deceptive and unacceptable. "One individual's wish for self-preservation at the expense of everyone else," wrote he.

For somebody who prizes propriety and sets high importance in business being conducted with confidentiality, if not outright secrecy, here was a further illustration of how unusual things have grown at Celtic.

The major figure, the club's dominant presence, moves in the background. The remote leader, the one with the authority to take all the major calls he wants without having the obligation of justifying them in any public forum.

He does not participate in team AGMs, sending his son, Ross, in his place. He seldom, if ever, gives interviews about Celtic unless they're hagiographic in nature. And still, he's slow to communicate.

He has been known on an rare moment to support the organization with confidential messages to news outlets, but nothing is heard in the open.

It's exactly how he's wanted it to remain. And that's just what he went against when launching full thermonuclear on Rodgers on that day.

The official line from the team is that he stepped down, but reviewing his invective, line by line, you have to wonder why he permit it to reach such a critical point?

Assuming the manager is guilty of every one of the accusations that Desmond is alleging he's responsible for, then it is reasonable to inquire why was the manager not removed?

He has accused him of spinning information in open forums that were inconsistent with the facts.

He claims his words "have contributed to a hostile atmosphere around the team and encouraged hostility towards members of the management and the directors. A portion of the abuse directed at them, and at their families, has been entirely unjustified and unacceptable."

Such an remarkable charge, that is. Lawyers might be mobilising as we discuss.

'Rodgers' Ambition Conflicted with the Club's Model Once More'

Looking back to happier days, they were close, Dermot and Brendan. Rodgers praised the shareholder at every turn, expressed gratitude to him every chance. Rodgers deferred to Dermot and, really, to nobody else.

It was Desmond who took the heat when his comeback occurred, after the previous manager.

It was the most controversial appointment, the return of the returning hero for some supporters or, as other Celtic fans would have described it, the arrival of the shameless one, who departed in the difficulty for another club.

The shareholder had Rodgers' support. Gradually, the manager employed the charm, achieved the wins and the honors, and an uneasy truce with the fans turned into a affectionate relationship once more.

It was inevitable - always - going to be a moment when Rodgers' goals clashed with Celtic's operational approach, however.

It happened in his initial tenure and it happened again, with bells on, over the last year. He spoke openly about the sluggish process the team went about their transfer business, the endless waiting for targets to be secured, then missed, as was too often the situation as far as he was concerned.

Time and again he spoke about the need for what he termed "flexibility" in the transfer window. Supporters concurred with him.

Despite the club spent unprecedented sums of funds in a calendar year on the £11m one signing, the costly another player and the £6m Auston Trusty - all of whom have cut it so far, with one since having left - the manager demanded increased resources and, often, he expressed this in public.

He set a controversy about a lack of cohesion within the team and then walked away. When asked about his comments at his subsequent media briefing he would usually downplay it and nearly reverse what he stated.

Lack of cohesion? No, no, everybody is aligned, he'd say. It appeared like he was playing a risky game.

Earlier this year there was a report in a newspaper that purportedly originated from a source close to the organization. It said that the manager was harming Celtic with his public outbursts and that his real motivation was managing his exit strategy.

He desired not to be there and he was arranging his exit, that was the tone of the article.

The fans were enraged. They then viewed him as similar to a martyr who might be carried out on his shield because his directors did not support his plans to bring triumph.

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

At that point it was clear the manager was shedding the backing of the people above him.

The frequent {gripes