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Just fifteen minutes following Celtic released the news of Brendan Rodgers' shock departure via a perfunctory short communication, the howitzer arrived, courtesy of Dermot Desmond, with clear signs in obvious anger.

Through 551-words, key investor Dermot Desmond savaged his former ally.

This individual he convinced to join the club when their rivals were getting uppity in 2016 and required being in their place. And the figure he once more relied on after the previous manager left for Tottenham in the summer of 2023.

Such was the severity of Desmond's takedown, the jaw-dropping return of Martin O'Neill was almost an secondary note.

Twenty years 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 playing of all his past successes at the team, O'Neill is back in the manager's seat.

Currently - and maybe for a time. Considering comments he has expressed recently, he has been eager to secure another job. He will view this one as the perfect chance, a present from the club's legacy, a homecoming to the place where he enjoyed such success and adulation.

Will he give it up readily? It seems unlikely. The club might well reach out to contact Postecoglou, but the new appointment will act as a soothing presence for the time being.

'Full-blooded Effort at Character Assassination

O'Neill's return - however strange as it may be - can be parked because the biggest 'wow!' development was the brutal way Desmond wrote of the former manager.

This constituted a forceful endeavor at character assassination, a branding of him as untrustful, a perpetrator of falsehoods, a disseminator of misinformation; divisive, deceptive and unacceptable. "A single person's wish for self-interest at the cost of others," stated he.

For somebody who values propriety and places great store in dealings being conducted with discretion, if not complete privacy, here was another illustration of how unusual things have grown at Celtic.

The major figure, the club's most powerful presence, operates in the background. The absentee totem, the individual with the power to make all the important decisions he wants without having the obligation of explaining them in any open setting.

He never attend team annual meetings, sending his son, Ross, in his place. He rarely, if ever, gives media talks about Celtic unless they're hagiographic in tone. And still, he's reluctant to speak out.

He has been known on an occasion or two to support the club with confidential missives to news outlets, but no statement is heard in public.

It's exactly how he's preferred it to be. And that's just what he contradicted when launching full thermonuclear on Rodgers on Monday.

The directive from the team is that Rodgers stepped down, but reviewing his invective, carefully, one must question why did he allow it to reach this far down the line?

Assuming the manager is culpable of all of the things that Desmond is claiming he's guilty of, then it's fair to ask why had been the coach not removed?

Desmond has charged him of spinning things in public that were inconsistent with the facts.

He says Rodgers' statements "played a part to a toxic atmosphere around the team and fuelled animosity towards members of the management and the directors. Some of the abuse aimed at them, and at their families, has been entirely unjustified and improper."

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

'Rodgers' Aspirations Clashed with Celtic's Model Once More'

Looking back to better days, they were close, the two men. Rodgers praised the shareholder at all opportunities, thanked him every chance. Rodgers deferred to him and, truly, to no one other.

This was the figure who took the criticism when Rodgers' returned occurred, after the previous manager.

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

The shareholder had his support. Over time, Rodgers turned on the charm, delivered the victories and the trophies, and an uneasy peace with the supporters became a love-in once more.

There was always - always - going to be a moment when Rodgers' goals clashed with the club's operational approach, though.

It happened in his first incarnation and it happened once more, with added intensity, over the last year. Rodgers publicly commented about the slow process Celtic went about their player acquisitions, the interminable waiting for prospects to be landed, then not landed, as was frequently the case as far as he was believed.

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

Despite the organization splurged unprecedented sums of funds in a calendar year on the expensive one signing, the £9m Adam Idah and the £6m further acquisition - none of whom have performed well so far, with Idah since having left - the manager pushed for increased resources and, oftentimes, he expressed this in openly.

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 said.

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

Earlier this year there was a story in a publication that purportedly came from a insider associated with the organization. It claimed that the manager was harming the team with his public outbursts and that his real motivation was managing his departure plan.

He didn't want to be present and he was engineering his exit, this was the tone of the story.

Supporters were enraged. They now viewed him as akin to a martyr who might be removed on his shield because his board members wouldn't back his vision to achieve success.

This disclosure was poisonous, of course, and it was meant to hurt him, which it did. He demanded for an investigation and for the guilty person to be dismissed. Whether there was a probe then we heard nothing further about it.

By then it was clear the manager was losing the backing of the people in charge.

The regular {gripes