🔗 Share this article

Just fifteen minutes following the club issued the news of Brendan Rodgers' shock resignation via a perfunctory five-paragraph statement, the bombshell landed, courtesy of the major shareholder, with clear signs in apparent fury.

Through 551-words, major shareholder Desmond savaged his old chum.

This individual he persuaded to come to the club when their rivals were gaining ground in that period and required being back in a box. And the figure he once more relied on after Ange Postecoglou departed to another club in the summer of 2023.

So intense was the severity of Desmond's takedown, the jaw-dropping return of the former boss was practically an after-thought.

Twenty years after his exit from the organization, and after a large part of his latter years was dedicated to an continuous circuit of public speaking engagements and the playing of all his past successes at Celtic, O'Neill is returned in the dugout.

For now - and maybe for a time. Considering comments he has said recently, he has been keen to secure another job. He will view this role as the perfect opportunity, a gift from the Celtic Gods, a homecoming to the environment where he enjoyed such success and adulation.

Will he relinquish it easily? You wouldn't have thought so. The club might well make a call to contact Postecoglou, but O'Neill will serve as a balm for the time being.

All-out Effort at Character Assassination

The new manager's return - however strange as it is - can be set aside because the most significant shocking development was the harsh way the shareholder described the former manager.

It was a full-blooded endeavor at defamation, a labeling of Rodgers as untrustful, a perpetrator of untruths, a disseminator of falsehoods; disruptive, misleading and unacceptable. "A single person's desire for self-preservation at the expense of others," wrote he.

For somebody who values propriety and places great store in business being conducted with discretion, if not complete secrecy, here was a further illustration of how abnormal situations have grown at Celtic.

The major figure, the organization's most powerful figure, operates in the margins. The absentee totem, 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 club annual meetings, sending his son, Ross, in his place. He rarely, if ever, does interviews about the team unless they're hagiographic in tone. And still, he's slow to speak out.

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

This is precisely how he's wanted it to remain. And it's just what he went against when launching all-out attack on Rodgers on Monday.

The official line from the team is that Rodgers resigned, but reviewing his invective, line by line, you have to wonder why did he allow it to get such a critical point?

If the manager is culpable of all of the things that the shareholder is claiming he's guilty of, then it's fair to ask why was the manager not removed?

He has charged him of distorting things in open forums that did not tally with the facts.

He says Rodgers' words "have contributed to a toxic environment around the club and fuelled hostility towards members of the management and the board. A portion of the criticism directed at them, and at their families, has been completely unjustified and unacceptable."

What an extraordinary allegation, that is. Lawyers might be mobilising as we discuss.

His Aspirations Clashed with the Club's Strategy Once More'

Looking back to happier days, they were tight, Dermot and Brendan. The manager lauded the shareholder at all opportunities, expressed gratitude to him whenever possible. Rodgers deferred to Dermot and, truly, to nobody else.

It was the figure who took the criticism when Rodgers' comeback 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 described it, the arrival of the shameless one, who departed in the lurch for Leicester.

Desmond had Rodgers' support. Over time, Rodgers turned on the charm, delivered the wins and the trophies, and an fragile peace with the supporters turned into a affectionate relationship once more.

It was inevitable - consistently - going to be a moment when his ambition came in contact with Celtic's operational approach, though.

It happened in his initial tenure and it happened again, with added intensity, over the last year. He publicly commented about the slow process the team conducted their player acquisitions, 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 spoke about the necessity for what he termed "agility" in the market. The fans concurred with him.

Despite the club spent record amounts of funds in a calendar year on the expensive one signing, the costly Adam Idah and the £6m further acquisition - none of whom have cut it so far, with Idah since having departed - Rodgers demanded more and more and, oftentimes, he expressed this in openly.

He set 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 usually minimize it and almost contradict what he stated.

Internal issues? Not at all, all are united, he'd say. It appeared like Rodgers was engaging in a risky game.

Earlier this year there was a report in a newspaper that purportedly originated from a source associated with the club. It said that the manager was harming Celtic with his public outbursts and that his true aim was managing his exit strategy.

He didn't want to be there and he was engineering his way out, this was the implication of the story.

Supporters were angered. They then saw him as similar to a martyr who might be removed on his shield because his directors wouldn't back his vision to bring success.

The leak was poisonous, of course, and it was intended to harm him, which it accomplished. He called for an investigation and for the guilty person to be removed. If there was a examination then we heard nothing further about it.

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

The frequent {gripes