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Just fifteen minutes after the club issued the news of Brendan Rodgers' surprising departure via a brief short communication, the bombshell landed, courtesy of Dermot Desmond, with clear signs in obvious anger.

In an extensive statement, key investor Dermot Desmond eviscerated his former ally.

This individual he convinced to come to the club when their rivals were gaining ground in 2016 and required being in their place. And the man 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 return of the former boss was practically an secondary note.

Twenty years after his departure from the organization, and after a large part of his latter years was given over to an unending circuit of public speaking engagements and the performance of all his past successes at Celtic, O'Neill is returned in the manager's seat.

For now - and maybe for a while. Based on comments he has said recently, O'Neill has been keen to secure a new position. He'll see this one as the perfect opportunity, a present from the Celtic Gods, a homecoming to the environment where he enjoyed such success and adulation.

Will he give it up easily? It seems unlikely. The club could possibly make a call to contact Postecoglou, but O'Neill will serve as a soothing presence for the moment.

'Full-blooded Effort at Character Assassination

The new manager's reappearance - as surreal as it is - can be set aside because the biggest 'wow!' development was the harsh way Desmond described the former manager.

This constituted a full-blooded endeavor at character assassination, a labeling of him as untrustful, a perpetrator of falsehoods, a disseminator of misinformation; divisive, misleading and unjustifiable. "A single person's wish for self-interest at the cost of everyone else," stated Desmond.

For somebody who prizes decorum and places great store in business being done with confidentiality, if not complete privacy, here was a further example of how abnormal situations have become at Celtic.

The major figure, the club's dominant figure, moves in the background. The absentee totem, the one with the authority to take all the major calls he pleases without having the obligation of justifying them in any open setting.

He does not participate in club AGMs, sending his offspring, Ross, in his place. He rarely, if ever, gives interviews about the team unless they're glowing in tone. And even then, he's reluctant to speak out.

There have been instances on an occasion or two to defend the organization with private messages to news outlets, but no statement is made in public.

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

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

Assuming Rodgers is culpable of every one of the things that Desmond is claiming he's responsible for, then it is reasonable to ask why had been the manager not dismissed?

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

He claims his words "have contributed to a hostile environment around the club and fuelled hostility towards individuals of the executive team and the directors. Some of the criticism directed at them, and at their families, has been entirely unjustified and improper."

Such an remarkable charge, indeed. Legal representatives might be mobilising as we speak.

His Ambition Conflicted with the Club's Strategy Once More'

Looking back to better days, they were close, the two men. The manager praised the shareholder at all opportunities, thanked him every chance. Brendan deferred to him and, truly, to nobody else.

It was Desmond who took the heat when Rodgers' comeback occurred, post-Postecoglou.

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

The shareholder had his back. Gradually, the manager turned on the charm, achieved the victories and the trophies, and an uneasy truce with the supporters became a love-in once more.

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

It happened in his initial tenure and it transpired again, with bells on, recently. Rodgers spoke openly about the sluggish process the team conducted their transfer business, the endless waiting for prospects to be secured, then not landed, as was too often the case as far as he was concerned.

Repeatedly he stated about the necessity for what he termed "agility" in the transfer window. The fans concurred with him.

Even when the organization spent record amounts of money in a twelve-month period on the £11m one signing, the costly Adam Idah 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, 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 news conference he would typically downplay it and almost contradict what he stated.

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

Earlier this year there was a report in a publication that purportedly came from a source associated with the club. It said that Rodgers was damaging Celtic with his open criticisms and that his true aim was managing his exit strategy.

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

Supporters were angered. They now saw him as akin to a sacrificial figure who might be carried out on his honor because his board members wouldn't support his vision to bring triumph.

This disclosure was poisonous, naturally, and it was meant to harm Rodgers, which it did. He demanded for an investigation and for the guilty person to be removed. Whether there was a probe then we learned nothing further about it.

By then it was clear Rodgers was losing the support of the individuals above him.

The frequent {gripes