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Merely fifteen minutes after Celtic released the announcement of Brendan Rodgers' surprising resignation via a perfunctory short statement, the howitzer landed, courtesy of Dermot Desmond, with clear signs in obvious anger.

In 551-words, key investor Desmond eviscerated his old chum.

The man he convinced to come to the club when their rivals were gaining ground in 2016 and needed putting back in a box. Plus the man he once more relied on after Ange Postecoglou departed to another club in the recent offseason.

So intense was the severity of Desmond's critique, the astonishing return of the former boss was practically 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 unending series of appearances and the playing of all his old hits at Celtic, O'Neill is returned in the dugout.

Currently - and perhaps for a time. Considering things he has said recently, O'Neill has been eager to secure a new position. He'll see this one as the ultimate opportunity, a gift from the Celtic Gods, a homecoming to the environment where he enjoyed such success and adulation.

Would he relinquish it easily? It seems unlikely. Celtic might well reach out to sound out Postecoglou, but O'Neill will act as a soothing presence for the time being.

All-out Effort at Character Assassination

The new manager's reappearance - as surreal as it is - can be set aside because the biggest shocking moment was the harsh way the shareholder wrote of the former manager.

It was a forceful attempt at defamation, a branding of him as deceitful, a perpetrator of falsehoods, a spreader of misinformation; disruptive, misleading and unjustifiable. "One individual's desire for self-preservation at the cost of everyone else," wrote he.

For somebody who prizes decorum and sets high importance in business being done with confidentiality, if not complete privacy, this was a further illustration of how unusual things have become at Celtic.

Desmond, the organization's dominant figure, operates in the background. The remote leader, the individual with the authority to make all the important decisions he wants without having the obligation of explaining them in any public forum.

He never attend club AGMs, dispatching his son, his son, instead. He seldom, if ever, does interviews about the team unless they're hagiographic in tone. And even then, he's slow to speak out.

There have been instances on an occasion or two to defend the club with confidential messages to media organisations, but nothing is made in public.

It's exactly how he's preferred it to remain. And that's just what he contradicted when going all-out attack on Rodgers on that day.

The official line from the team is that he resigned, but reviewing Desmond's invective, line by line, you have to wonder why did he allow it to reach this far down the line?

If Rodgers is guilty of all of the accusations that Desmond is claiming he's responsible for, then it's fair to ask why was the manager not dismissed?

He has accused him of spinning information in public that did not tally with the facts.

He claims Rodgers' words "played a part to a toxic atmosphere around the club and fuelled animosity towards members of the management and the directors. A portion of the criticism aimed at them, and at their loved ones, has been entirely unjustified and unacceptable."

What an extraordinary charge, that is. Legal representatives might be preparing as we speak.

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

Looking back to better times, they were tight, the two men. Rodgers lauded the shareholder at all opportunities, expressed gratitude to him whenever possible. Rodgers respected him and, really, to nobody else.

It was the figure who drew the criticism when his returned happened, after the previous manager.

This marked the most divisive hiring, the reappearance of the prodigal son for some supporters or, as some other supporters would have put it, the arrival of the shameless one, who departed in the lurch for Leicester.

The shareholder had Rodgers' back. Gradually, the manager turned on the persuasion, achieved the victories and the trophies, and an uneasy truce with the fans became a affectionate relationship once more.

There was always - consistently - going to be a point when his ambition came in contact with the club's operational approach, though.

This occurred in his first incarnation and it happened again, with bells on, over the last year. Rodgers publicly commented about the sluggish process Celtic went about their player acquisitions, the endless waiting for prospects to be landed, then not landed, as was frequently the case as far as he was concerned.

Repeatedly he stated about the necessity for what he termed "agility" in the market. The fans agreed with him.

Despite the club spent record amounts of money in a twelve-month period on the £11m one signing, the £9m another player and the significant further acquisition - none of whom have cut it to date, with Idah since having departed - Rodgers demanded increased resources and, oftentimes, he did it in public.

He planted a bomb about a lack of cohesion inside the club and then distanced himself. Upon questioning about his comments at his subsequent news conference he would typically minimize it and almost reverse what he stated.

Internal issues? Not at all, everybody is aligned, he'd claim. It looked like Rodgers was engaging in a risky game.

A few months back there was a story in a publication that purportedly came from a source associated with the organization. It claimed that the manager was damaging Celtic with his open criticisms and that his true aim was managing his exit strategy.

He didn't want to be there and he was engineering his exit, this was the tone of the story.

Supporters were enraged. They then saw him as similar to a sacrificial figure who might be removed on his honor because his directors wouldn't back his vision to achieve success.

This disclosure was damaging, of course, and it was meant to hurt Rodgers, which it did. He called for an inquiry and for the responsible individual to be removed. Whether there was a probe then we heard nothing further about it.

At that point it was plain the manager was losing the support of the people in charge.

The regular {gripes