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Just a quarter of an hour following the club issued the news of Brendan Rodgers' surprising resignation via a perfunctory five-paragraph communication, the bombshell arrived, courtesy of the major shareholder, with whiskers twitching in apparent fury.

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

This individual he convinced to come to the club when their rivals were gaining ground in that period and needed putting back in a box. And the man he again turned to after Ange Postecoglou departed to another club in the recent offseason.

So intense was the ferocity of his critique, the astonishing comeback of Martin O'Neill 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 continuous circuit of appearances and the playing of all his old hits at Celtic, O'Neill is back in the manager's seat.

For now - and perhaps for a time. Based on comments he has said lately, O'Neill has been keen to secure a new position. He'll see this role as the perfect opportunity, a present from the Celtic Gods, a return to the place where he enjoyed such glory and adulation.

Will he give it up readily? It seems unlikely. The club could possibly reach out to sound out Postecoglou, but O'Neill will serve as a balm for the time being.

'Full-blooded Effort at Character Assassination

O'Neill's reappearance - as surreal as it may be - can be parked because the biggest 'wow!' development was the harsh way the shareholder wrote of the former manager.

This constituted a forceful attempt at character assassination, a labeling of him as untrustful, a source of untruths, a spreader of misinformation; disruptive, misleading and unjustifiable. "A single person's desire for self-interest at the cost of others," wrote he.

For a person who values decorum and sets high importance in dealings being conducted with confidentiality, if not complete secrecy, here was another illustration of how unusual situations have grown at Celtic.

Desmond, the organization's most powerful presence, operates in the background. The remote leader, the one with the power to take all the major calls he pleases without having the obligation of justifying them in any public forum.

He does not attend team annual meetings, sending his son, Ross, instead. He seldom, if ever, gives media talks about Celtic unless they're hagiographic in nature. And still, he's slow to communicate.

He has been known on an rare moment to defend the organization with confidential missives to media organisations, but no statement is made in public.

This is precisely how he's wanted it to be. And that's just what he contradicted when launching full thermonuclear on the manager on that day.

The directive from the club is that Rodgers stepped down, but reviewing his criticism, carefully, you have to wonder why he permit 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 inquire why had been the coach not dismissed?

Desmond has accused him of distorting things in open forums that did not tally with reality.

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

What an remarkable allegation, indeed. Legal representatives might be mobilising as we speak.

'Rodgers' Aspirations Clashed with Celtic's Strategy Once More'

Looking back to happier days, they were tight, Dermot and Brendan. Rodgers praised the shareholder at every turn, expressed gratitude to him whenever possible. Brendan respected Dermot and, really, to nobody else.

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

It was the most controversial appointment, the return of the returning hero for some supporters or, as other supporters would have put it, the return of the shameless one, who departed in the difficulty for another club.

The shareholder had his back. Gradually, the manager turned on the persuasion, achieved the victories and the trophies, and an fragile truce with the supporters became a love-in again.

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

It happened in his initial tenure and it transpired once more, with bells on, over the last year. He publicly commented about the slow way Celtic conducted their transfer business, the interminable waiting for prospects to be landed, then missed, as was too often the situation as far as he was concerned.

Time and again he spoke about the necessity for what he termed "agility" in the market. The fans agreed with him.

Even when the organization spent unprecedented sums of money in a twelve-month period on the £11m Arne Engels, the £9m Adam Idah and the significant further acquisition - none of whom have cut it to date, with one already having left - the manager pushed for more and more and, often, he expressed this in openly.

He set a controversy about a lack of cohesion within the club and then walked away. When asked about his remarks at his next media briefing he would usually downplay it and almost contradict what he said.

Lack of cohesion? Not at all, all are united, he'd claim. It looked like Rodgers was engaging in a dangerous game.

Earlier this year there was a story in a newspaper that allegedly originated from a insider associated with the club. It said that Rodgers was harming Celtic with his public outbursts and that his real motivation was managing his departure plan.

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

The fans were enraged. They now viewed him as similar to a martyr who might be carried out on his shield because his board members did not support his plans to achieve success.

The leak was poisonous, naturally, and it was meant to hurt him, which it accomplished. He demanded for an inquiry and for the guilty person to be removed. Whether there was a probe then we heard no more about it.

At that point it was plain Rodgers was shedding the backing of the people above him.

The regular {gripes