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Just a quarter of an hour after Celtic issued the announcement of their manager's surprising departure via a perfunctory short communication, the bombshell landed, from Dermot Desmond, with clear signs in apparent anger.

Through 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 required being back in a box. Plus the figure he once more relied on after Ange Postecoglou left for another club in the recent offseason.

Such was the ferocity of his takedown, the astonishing comeback of the former boss was almost an after-thought.

Two decades after his exit from the organization, and after a large part of his latter years was given over to an unending circuit of appearances and the performance of all his old hits at the team, O'Neill is returned in the manager's seat.

Currently - and perhaps for a time. Based on comments he has said recently, he has been eager to secure a new position. He'll see this role as the perfect chance, a gift from the club's legacy, a return to the place where he enjoyed such glory and praise.

Would he relinquish it easily? It seems unlikely. The club might well make a call to contact their ex-manager, but the new appointment will serve as a soothing presence for the moment.

'Full-blooded Attempt at Reputation Destruction'

The new manager's return - as surreal as it is - can be parked because the most significant shocking development was the brutal way Desmond described Rodgers.

It was a full-blooded attempt at defamation, a labeling of Rodgers as deceitful, a source of falsehoods, a disseminator of misinformation; disruptive, deceptive and unjustifiable. "A single person's desire for self-interest at the cost of everyone else," stated Desmond.

For somebody who values decorum and sets high importance in business being done with discretion, if not complete secrecy, this was another illustration of how unusual situations have become at the club.

Desmond, the club's dominant figure, operates in the background. The absentee totem, the one with the authority to take all the important calls he wants without having the obligation of justifying them in any public forum.

He never attend team annual meetings, dispatching his offspring, his son, in his place. He rarely, if ever, gives interviews about Celtic unless they're glowing in nature. And still, he's reluctant to communicate.

He has been known on an rare moment to defend 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 exactly what he contradicted when going full thermonuclear on the manager on that day.

The directive from the club is that he resigned, but reviewing Desmond's criticism, carefully, one must question why did he permit it to get this far down the line?

If the manager is guilty of every one of the accusations that Desmond is alleging he's responsible for, then it is reasonable to ask why had been the coach not dismissed?

Desmond has charged him of spinning information in open forums that did not tally with reality.

He claims his words "played a part to a hostile environment around the team and fuelled hostility towards members of the executive team and the directors. Some of the criticism directed at them, and at their loved ones, has been entirely unwarranted and unacceptable."

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

'Rodgers' Ambition Clashed with the Club's Model Again

Looking back to better days, they were close, the two men. The manager praised Desmond at every turn, thanked him every chance. Rodgers deferred to Dermot and, truly, to nobody else.

This was Desmond who took the heat when Rodgers' returned happened, after the previous manager.

This marked 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 another club.

The shareholder had his support. Over time, Rodgers employed the persuasion, achieved the wins and the honors, and an fragile truce with the fans turned into a love-in once more.

It was inevitable - always - going to be a moment when Rodgers' goals came in contact with the club's business model, however.

It happened in his first incarnation and it transpired again, with bells on, recently. Rodgers publicly commented about the slow process the team conducted their player acquisitions, the endless delay for prospects to be landed, then not landed, as was frequently the situation as far as he was believed.

Repeatedly he spoke about the necessity for what he termed "agility" in the market. The fans concurred with him.

Despite the organization spent unprecedented sums of money in a calendar year on the £11m Arne Engels, the costly another player and the significant Auston Trusty - none of whom have performed well to date, with one since having left - the manager pushed for increased resources and, oftentimes, he did it in openly.

He planted a controversy about a internal disunity within the club and then distanced himself. Upon questioning about his remarks at his next news conference he would usually minimize it and nearly contradict what he said.

Lack of cohesion? Not at all, all are united, he'd claim. It looked like he was playing a dangerous strategy.

A few months back there was a story in a publication that purportedly originated from a source associated with the organization. It claimed that Rodgers was harming the team with his open criticisms and that his real motivation was orchestrating his exit strategy.

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

Supporters were angered. They then viewed him as akin to a sacrificial figure who might be carried out on his shield because his directors wouldn't support his plans to bring triumph.

This disclosure was poisonous, of course, and it was intended to hurt him, which it accomplished. He demanded for an inquiry and for the guilty person to be dismissed. Whether there was a examination then we learned no more about it.

By then it was plain Rodgers was losing the backing of the people above him.

The frequent {gripes