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Merely fifteen minutes following the club released the announcement of Brendan Rodgers' surprising resignation via a perfunctory short communication, the bombshell landed, from Dermot Desmond, with clear signs in apparent anger.

Through an extensive statement, major shareholder Desmond eviscerated his old chum.

The man he convinced to join the team when Rangers were gaining ground in 2016 and needed putting in their place. Plus the man he once more relied on after the previous manager departed to another club in the recent offseason.

So intense was the severity of Desmond's takedown, the jaw-dropping comeback of the former boss was almost an secondary note.

Twenty years after his exit from the organization, and after a large part of his recent life was dedicated to an continuous circuit of appearances and the playing of all his past successes at the team, O'Neill is returned in the dugout.

For now - and perhaps for a time. Based on comments he has said lately, O'Neill has been keen to get a new position. He will see this one as the ultimate opportunity, a present from the Celtic Gods, a return to the place where he experienced such glory and praise.

Will he relinquish it readily? You wouldn't have thought so. The club might well reach out to sound out their ex-manager, but the new appointment will act as a balm for the moment.

'Full-blooded Effort at Character Assassination

O'Neill's return - however strange as it may be - can be parked because the most significant shocking development was the brutal manner Desmond described the former manager.

This constituted a full-blooded attempt at character assassination, a labeling of Rodgers as deceitful, a perpetrator of falsehoods, a spreader of falsehoods; divisive, misleading and unacceptable. "One individual's wish for self-interest at the cost of everyone else," wrote Desmond.

For somebody who values propriety and places great store in business being done with confidentiality, if not outright privacy, here was another illustration of how unusual things have grown at the club.

The major figure, the club's most powerful figure, operates in the background. The remote leader, the individual with the power to take all the important decisions he pleases without having the obligation of justifying them in any public forum.

He never participate in team AGMs, sending his offspring, Ross, in his place. He rarely, if ever, does interviews about the team unless they're glowing in tone. And still, he's reluctant to speak out.

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

It's exactly how he's preferred it to be. And that's exactly what he contradicted when going all-out attack on the manager on Monday.

The directive from the club is that he stepped down, but reading his criticism, carefully, one must question why he permit it to get such a critical point?

If Rodgers is culpable of all of the things that the shareholder is claiming he's responsible for, then it is reasonable to ask why had been the coach not removed?

He has charged him of spinning information in public that were inconsistent with the facts.

He says Rodgers' words "played a part to a toxic environment around the club and fuelled animosity towards members of the management and the directors. Some of the criticism directed at them, and at their loved ones, has been entirely unwarranted and unacceptable."

What an extraordinary allegation, indeed. Legal representatives might be mobilising as we discuss.

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

To return to better times, they were close, the two men. Rodgers praised the shareholder at every turn, thanked him whenever possible. Rodgers respected Dermot and, truly, to no one other.

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

It was the most controversial appointment, the reappearance of the returning hero for a few or, as some other Celtic fans would have put it, the arrival of the shameless one, who left them in the difficulty for another club.

The shareholder had Rodgers' back. Over time, the manager employed the charm, delivered the victories and the trophies, and an fragile peace with the supporters became a love-in once more.

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

This occurred in his first incarnation and it transpired once more, with bells on, over the last year. He spoke openly about the sluggish way Celtic went about their player acquisitions, the interminable waiting for targets to be secured, then missed, as was too often the case as far as he was concerned.

Repeatedly he spoke about the need for what he termed "flexibility" in the market. Supporters agreed with him.

Even when the club spent unprecedented sums of funds in a twelve-month period on the expensive one signing, the £9m Adam Idah and the significant Auston Trusty - all of whom have performed well to date, with one since having departed - the manager pushed for increased resources and, often, he expressed this in openly.

He planted a bomb about a lack of cohesion inside the team and then distanced himself. Upon questioning about his remarks at his subsequent media briefing he would usually downplay it and almost contradict what he said.

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

Earlier this year there was a story in a publication that allegedly came from a insider associated with the club. It claimed that Rodgers was damaging the team with his open criticisms and that his real motivation was orchestrating his departure plan.

He desired not to be there and he was arranging his way out, this was the implication of the story.

The fans were angered. They then saw him as similar to a sacrificial figure who might be carried out on his shield because his directors wouldn't support his plans to bring success.

The leak was damaging, of course, and it was intended to harm him, which it accomplished. He called for an inquiry and for the responsible individual to be dismissed. Whether there was a probe then we learned nothing further about it.

At that point it was clear Rodgers was shedding the backing of the people in charge.

The regular {gripes