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Merely fifteen minutes after Celtic issued the news of their manager's surprising resignation via a perfunctory five-paragraph statement, the bombshell arrived, courtesy of the major shareholder, with whiskers twitching in obvious fury.

Through 551-words, major shareholder Desmond savaged his old chum.

The man he convinced to come to the team when Rangers were gaining ground in that period and required being in their place. And the figure he once more turned to after the previous manager departed to another club in the summer of 2023.

So intense was the ferocity of Desmond's takedown, the astonishing return of the former boss was practically an secondary note.

Two decades after his exit from the club, and after a large part of his recent life was dedicated to an continuous series of appearances and the performance of all his old hits at the team, Martin O'Neill is back in the manager's seat.

Currently - and maybe for a while. Considering comments he has expressed lately, he has been eager to get another job. He'll see this one as the ultimate opportunity, a present from the Celtic Gods, a homecoming to the place where he experienced such success and praise.

Will he give it up easily? You wouldn't have thought so. Celtic could possibly make a call to contact Postecoglou, but the new appointment will act as a soothing presence for the moment.

'Full-blooded Effort at Character Assassination

O'Neill's reappearance - as surreal as it may be - can be parked because the most significant shocking moment was the brutal manner Desmond wrote of Rodgers.

This constituted a forceful attempt at character assassination, a labeling of Rodgers as untrustful, a source of falsehoods, a disseminator of falsehoods; divisive, misleading and unjustifiable. "One individual's desire for self-preservation at the cost of everyone else," stated he.

For somebody who values propriety and sets high importance in dealings being conducted with confidentiality, if not outright privacy, this was a further example of how abnormal things have grown at Celtic.

The major figure, the club's dominant figure, operates in the background. The absentee totem, the individual with the authority to make all the major decisions he pleases without having the responsibility of explaining them in any open setting.

He never participate in team AGMs, sending his offspring, Ross, in his place. He seldom, if ever, does media talks about the team unless they're glowing in tone. And still, he's slow to communicate.

He has been known on an occasion or two to defend the organization with private missives to news outlets, but no statement is made in public.

This is precisely how he's preferred it to remain. And that's exactly what he went against when going full thermonuclear on Rodgers on that day.

The directive from the team is that Rodgers resigned, but reviewing his invective, line by line, one must question why he permit it to reach this far down the line?

If Rodgers is guilty of all of the things that the shareholder is claiming he's responsible for, then it is reasonable to inquire why was the coach not dismissed?

Desmond has charged him of spinning things in public that did not tally with reality.

He says Rodgers' words "played a part to a toxic environment around the club and encouraged animosity towards individuals of the executive team and the board. A portion of the criticism directed at them, and at their loved ones, has been completely unjustified and improper."

What an extraordinary charge, that is. Legal representatives might be preparing as we speak.

His Aspirations Clashed with the Club's Strategy Once More'

Looking back to happier days, they were close, the two men. The manager lauded the shareholder at all opportunities, expressed gratitude to him every chance. Brendan respected him and, truly, to nobody else.

This was Desmond who drew the criticism when his returned occurred, post-Postecoglou.

It was the most controversial hiring, the return of the returning hero for some supporters or, as other Celtic fans would have put it, the arrival of the shameless one, who departed in the lurch for Leicester.

The shareholder had his back. Over time, the manager turned on the persuasion, achieved the victories and the honors, and an uneasy peace with the supporters became a affectionate relationship once more.

There was always - consistently - going to be a moment when Rodgers' goals came in contact with the club's operational approach, however.

This occurred in his first incarnation and it happened once more, with added intensity, over the last year. Rodgers spoke openly about the slow way the team went about their player acquisitions, the interminable waiting for prospects to be landed, then missed, as was too often the case as far as he was believed.

Repeatedly he stated about the need for what he called "flexibility" in the market. The fans concurred with him.

Even when the organization spent unprecedented sums of money in a twelve-month period on the expensive Arne Engels, the costly another player and the significant further acquisition - none of whom have cut it so far, with one already having left - the manager demanded more and more and, often, he did it in public.

He planted a controversy about a internal disunity inside the club and then distanced himself. When asked about his comments at his subsequent media briefing he would usually downplay it and almost reverse what he said.

Internal issues? No, no, all are united, he'd say. It appeared like Rodgers was playing a risky game.

Earlier this year there was a story in a publication that allegedly came from a insider close to the organization. It claimed that Rodgers was damaging Celtic with his open criticisms and that his true aim was managing his departure plan.

He desired not to be present and he was engineering his way out, this was the tone of the article.

The fans were enraged. They now saw him as akin to a sacrificial figure who might be carried out on his shield because his directors did not support his plans to bring success.

The leak was damaging, naturally, and it was intended to hurt Rodgers, which it did. He called for an inquiry and for the responsible individual to be dismissed. Whether there was a probe then we learned nothing further about it.

By then it was plain Rodgers was shedding the support of the people above him.

The regular {gripes