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Merely a quarter of an hour following Celtic issued the announcement of their manager's shock departure via a brief short communication, the bombshell arrived, courtesy of Dermot Desmond, with clear signs in obvious fury.

In 551-words, key investor Desmond savaged his old chum.

This individual he persuaded to join the team when their rivals were getting uppity in 2016 and required being back in a box. Plus the man he again relied on after the previous manager left for Tottenham in the recent offseason.

Such was the ferocity of Desmond's critique, the astonishing return of the former boss was practically an after-thought.

Two decades after his departure from the organization, and after much of his recent life was dedicated to an unending series of public speaking engagements and the performance of all his old hits at the team, Martin O'Neill is returned in the manager's seat.

Currently - and maybe for a time. Considering comments he has said lately, he has been eager to secure another job. He'll see this one as the ultimate opportunity, a present from the Celtic Gods, a return to the environment where he enjoyed such success and praise.

Will he give it up easily? You wouldn't have thought so. The club might well reach out to contact their ex-manager, but O'Neill will act as a soothing presence for the moment.

'Full-blooded Attempt at Character Assassination

The new manager's reappearance - as surreal as it is - can be parked because the most significant 'wow!' moment was the harsh manner the shareholder described the former manager.

This constituted a forceful endeavor at defamation, a branding of Rodgers as untrustful, a source of untruths, a disseminator of misinformation; disruptive, misleading and unjustifiable. "A single person's desire for self-interest at the cost of others," stated he.

For somebody who prizes decorum and sets high importance in business being conducted with confidentiality, if not complete privacy, here was another example of how abnormal things have grown at the club.

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

He never attend team AGMs, dispatching his son, Ross, instead. He rarely, if ever, does interviews about Celtic unless they're hagiographic in nature. And still, he's reluctant to communicate.

He has been known on an rare moment to support the organization with private missives to media organisations, but no statement is heard in the open.

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

The directive from the club is that he resigned, but reviewing his invective, carefully, one must question why did he permit it to reach such a critical point?

If Rodgers is culpable of all of the accusations that Desmond is claiming he's responsible for, then it is reasonable to inquire why had been the coach not dismissed?

He has charged him of distorting information in open forums that were inconsistent with reality.

He says Rodgers' statements "have contributed to a hostile atmosphere around the team and encouraged animosity towards individuals of the executive team and the board. Some of the criticism aimed at them, and at their loved ones, has been entirely unwarranted and unacceptable."

Such an remarkable charge, indeed. Lawyers might be mobilising as we speak.

His Aspirations Conflicted with Celtic's Model Again

To return to happier times, they were tight, Dermot and Brendan. Rodgers lauded Desmond at every turn, thanked him whenever possible. Rodgers deferred to him and, truly, to nobody else.

This was the figure who took the criticism when Rodgers' comeback occurred, post-Postecoglou.

It was the most divisive hiring, the reappearance of the returning hero for some supporters or, as some other Celtic fans would have described it, the arrival of the unapologetic figure, who left them in the difficulty for Leicester.

Desmond had his back. Gradually, the manager turned on the charm, achieved the victories and the honors, and an uneasy truce with the fans turned into a love-in once more.

It was inevitable - consistently - going to be a point when his ambition came in contact with the club's operational approach, however.

This occurred in his initial tenure and it happened once more, with bells on, recently. Rodgers spoke openly about the sluggish way Celtic went about their player acquisitions, the interminable delay for targets to be secured, then not landed, as was frequently the situation as far as he was concerned.

Time and again he stated about the necessity for what he called "agility" in the transfer window. Supporters concurred with him.

Despite the organization splurged record amounts of money in a calendar year on the £11m one signing, the £9m another player and the £6m Auston Trusty - none of whom have cut it so far, with one already having departed - Rodgers pushed for increased resources and, oftentimes, he expressed this in openly.

He set a bomb about a internal disunity inside the club and then walked away. Upon questioning about his comments at his next news conference he would usually minimize it and almost reverse what he stated.

Lack of cohesion? No, no, everybody is aligned, he'd claim. It looked like Rodgers was engaging in a dangerous strategy.

A few months back there was a report in a newspaper that purportedly came from a insider associated with the organization. It said that Rodgers was damaging Celtic with his public outbursts and that his real motivation was orchestrating his departure plan.

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

The fans were enraged. They then saw him as akin to a martyr who might be carried out on his shield because his directors wouldn't support his plans to achieve success.

The leak was damaging, of course, and it was meant to harm Rodgers, which it accomplished. He called for an inquiry and for the guilty person to be removed. Whether there was a probe then we learned no more about it.

At that point it was clear the manager was shedding the support of the people in charge.

The frequent {gripes