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Merely a quarter of an hour after the club issued the news of Brendan Rodgers' surprising departure via a brief short statement, the bombshell arrived, courtesy of Dermot Desmond, with whiskers twitching in apparent fury.

In an extensive statement, major shareholder Dermot Desmond savaged his former ally.

The man he persuaded to join the team when their rivals were gaining ground in 2016 and needed putting back in a box. Plus the man he once more relied on after the previous manager departed to Tottenham in the recent offseason.

Such was the severity of his takedown, the jaw-dropping comeback of Martin O'Neill was almost an after-thought.

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

For now - and perhaps for a time. Considering things he has expressed lately, he has been eager to secure a new position. He will see this one as the ultimate chance, a present from the club's legacy, a homecoming to the place where he enjoyed such success and praise.

Would he give it up readily? It seems unlikely. The club might well reach out to sound out Postecoglou, but the new appointment will serve as a balm for the moment.

All-out Effort at Character Assassination

O'Neill's reappearance - as surreal as it may be - can be set aside because the most significant 'wow!' moment was the harsh manner Desmond described the former manager.

It was a forceful endeavor at defamation, a branding of him as deceitful, a source of untruths, a spreader of falsehoods; disruptive, deceptive and unjustifiable. "One individual's desire for self-interest at the cost of everyone else," wrote he.

For somebody who values decorum and places great store in dealings being done with discretion, if not outright privacy, here was a further illustration of how abnormal things have grown at Celtic.

The major figure, the organization's dominant figure, operates in the background. The absentee totem, the one with the power to take all the major decisions he pleases without having the obligation of explaining them in any public forum.

He does not attend club AGMs, sending his offspring, his son, in his place. He seldom, if ever, gives media talks about Celtic unless they're glowing in tone. And even then, he's slow to speak out.

He has been known on an rare moment to support the club with confidential messages to media organisations, but nothing is heard in public.

It's exactly how he's wanted it to be. And it's exactly what he went against when going all-out attack on the manager on that day.

The official line from the team is that he resigned, but reviewing his criticism, carefully, one must question why he allow it to reach such a critical point?

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

He has accused him of distorting information in public that did not tally with reality.

He says Rodgers' words "have contributed to a toxic atmosphere around the team and encouraged animosity towards members 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."

Such an extraordinary charge, indeed. Lawyers might be mobilising as we discuss.

'Rodgers' Aspirations Clashed with Celtic's Strategy Again

To return to happier times, they were tight, Dermot and Brendan. The manager praised the shareholder at all opportunities, thanked him whenever possible. Rodgers respected him and, really, to nobody else.

It was Desmond who took the criticism when his returned occurred, post-Postecoglou.

It was the most controversial appointment, the reappearance of the prodigal son for some supporters or, as other Celtic fans would have put it, the arrival of the shameless one, who left them in the difficulty for Leicester.

The shareholder had Rodgers' back. Over time, the manager employed the persuasion, achieved the wins and the trophies, and an uneasy peace with the supporters turned into a love-in once more.

It was inevitable - consistently - going to be a point when his goals clashed with the club's operational approach, however.

This occurred in his initial tenure and it happened again, with bells on, recently. Rodgers publicly commented about the sluggish process Celtic went about their player acquisitions, the endless delay for targets to be secured, then not landed, as was too often the situation as far as he was believed.

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

Even when the organization spent record amounts of funds in a twelve-month period on the expensive one signing, the £9m another player and the £6m further acquisition - none of whom have performed well so far, with one already having departed - the manager demanded increased resources and, often, he did it in openly.

He planted a controversy about a internal disunity within the club and then distanced himself. When asked about his remarks at his subsequent media briefing he would typically minimize it and almost contradict what he stated.

Internal issues? Not at all, everybody is aligned, he'd claim. It appeared like Rodgers was playing a dangerous strategy.

A few months back there was a report in a publication that allegedly originated from a insider close to the organization. It said that the manager was harming the team with his public outbursts and that his true aim was managing his departure plan.

He desired not to be there and he was arranging his exit, that was the tone of the story.

Supporters were angered. They now viewed him as similar to a martyr who might be removed on his shield because his directors did not support his plans to bring success.

The leak was damaging, of course, and it was meant to harm Rodgers, which it did. He called for an inquiry and for the guilty person to be removed. If there was a probe then we heard nothing further about it.

By then it was clear the manager was shedding the backing of the individuals in charge.

The frequent {gripes