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Merely a quarter of an hour following the club released the announcement of their manager's shock departure via a brief five-paragraph communication, the bombshell arrived, courtesy of the major shareholder, with whiskers twitching in obvious anger.

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

This individual he persuaded to join the club when their rivals were gaining ground in 2016 and needed putting back in a box. And the figure he once more turned to after the previous manager departed to another club in the summer of 2023.

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

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

Currently - and perhaps for a while. Considering comments he has said lately, he has been keen to get a new position. He will see this one as the ultimate opportunity, a gift from the club's legacy, a return to the place where he experienced such glory and adulation.

Would he relinquish it easily? You wouldn't have thought so. Celtic could possibly reach out to contact their ex-manager, 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 shocking development was the harsh manner the shareholder wrote of Rodgers.

It was a full-blooded endeavor at character assassination, a branding of Rodgers as deceitful, a source of untruths, a spreader of falsehoods; disruptive, deceptive and unacceptable. "A single person's desire for self-interest at the cost of everyone else," wrote he.

For a person who prizes decorum and places great store in dealings being done with confidentiality, if not outright secrecy, here was a further illustration of how abnormal things have grown at Celtic.

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

He does not attend team AGMs, sending his son, Ross, instead. He seldom, if ever, gives media talks about Celtic unless they're glowing in tone. And even then, he's reluctant to communicate.

There have been instances on an rare moment to support the club with private missives to news outlets, but no statement is made in the open.

This is precisely how he's preferred it to be. And it's exactly what he went against when going all-out attack on the manager on Monday.

The directive from the club is that he stepped down, but reviewing his invective, line by line, you have to wonder why did he allow it to get such a critical point?

If the manager is guilty of every one of the things that the shareholder is claiming he's responsible for, then it is reasonable to ask why had been the manager not dismissed?

Desmond has accused him of spinning information in public that did not tally with the facts.

He says Rodgers' statements "have contributed to a hostile atmosphere around the club and encouraged animosity towards individuals of the management and the board. Some of the abuse aimed at them, and at their loved ones, has been completely unjustified and unacceptable."

Such an remarkable allegation, that is. Legal representatives might be mobilising as we speak.

His Aspirations Clashed with Celtic's Model Once More'

To return to happier days, they were close, Dermot and Brendan. Rodgers lauded the shareholder at every turn, thanked him whenever possible. Rodgers respected Dermot and, truly, to no one other.

It was the figure who drew the criticism when Rodgers' comeback happened, after the previous manager.

It was the most controversial appointment, the return of the returning hero for some supporters or, as some other supporters would have put it, the return of the unapologetic figure, who left them in the difficulty for Leicester.

The shareholder had Rodgers' support. Gradually, Rodgers employed the persuasion, achieved the victories and the trophies, and an fragile truce with the fans turned into a affectionate relationship again.

There was always - consistently - going to be a moment when his ambition clashed with Celtic's operational approach, though.

It happened in his initial tenure and it happened again, with added intensity, over the last year. He spoke openly about the sluggish process the team conducted their transfer business, the interminable waiting for prospects to be landed, then missed, as was frequently the situation as far as he was believed.

Time and again he spoke about the necessity for what he termed "agility" in the transfer window. The fans concurred with him.

Even when the organization splurged record amounts of funds in a twelve-month period on the £11m Arne Engels, the costly Adam Idah and the significant Auston Trusty - none of whom have performed well so far, with Idah already having left - Rodgers pushed for more and more and, often, he did it in public.

He planted a bomb about a lack of cohesion within the team and then distanced himself. When asked about his remarks at his next media briefing he would typically minimize it and almost contradict what he said.

Lack of cohesion? Not at all, everybody is aligned, he'd say. It looked like he was playing a dangerous strategy.

Earlier this year there was a report in a publication that purportedly originated from a source associated with the organization. It claimed that Rodgers was damaging the team with his open criticisms and that his true aim was orchestrating his departure plan.

He didn't want to be present and he was arranging his exit, that was the tone of the article.

The fans were enraged. They now saw him as similar to a martyr who might be carried out on his shield because his directors did not back his vision to bring success.

This disclosure was damaging, of course, and it was intended to hurt Rodgers, which it accomplished. He called for an inquiry and for the responsible individual to be dismissed. Whether there was a examination then we learned nothing further about it.

At that point it was plain Rodgers was shedding the support of the individuals above him.

The frequent {gripes