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Just fifteen minutes following the club released the announcement of their manager's shock resignation via a perfunctory short communication, the bombshell arrived, courtesy of the major shareholder, with whiskers twitching in apparent anger.

Through 551-words, key investor Dermot Desmond savaged his old chum.

This individual he persuaded to join the club when their rivals were gaining ground in 2016 and needed putting in their place. And the man he again relied on after the previous manager left for another club in the recent offseason.

So intense was the severity of Desmond's critique, the astonishing return of Martin O'Neill was practically an secondary note.

Twenty years after his departure from the club, and after a large part of his recent life was given over to an continuous series of public speaking engagements and the performance of all his old hits at the team, O'Neill is back in the manager's seat.

Currently - and perhaps for a time. Considering comments he has said lately, he has been eager to secure another job. He'll see this role as the perfect opportunity, a gift from the club's legacy, a return to the environment where he experienced such success and adulation.

Would he give it up easily? It seems unlikely. The club might well reach out to contact their ex-manager, but O'Neill will act as a soothing presence for the time being.

All-out Attempt at Reputation Destruction'

O'Neill's return - as surreal as it is - can be set aside because the most significant 'wow!' moment was the harsh manner the shareholder wrote of the former manager.

This constituted a forceful endeavor at defamation, a labeling of him as untrustful, a perpetrator of falsehoods, a disseminator of misinformation; divisive, deceptive and unjustifiable. "One individual's wish for self-preservation at the cost of everyone else," wrote Desmond.

For somebody who values propriety and sets high importance in dealings being conducted with confidentiality, if not outright secrecy, here was another illustration of how unusual things have become at Celtic.

The major figure, the organization's dominant figure, operates in the background. The remote leader, the one with the authority to take all the important calls he pleases without having the responsibility of explaining them in any open setting.

He never participate in team AGMs, dispatching his offspring, his son, instead. He seldom, if ever, does media talks about the team unless they're glowing in nature. And even then, he's reluctant to communicate.

He has been known on an rare moment to support the club with confidential messages to media organisations, but nothing is made in the open.

This is precisely how he's wanted it to remain. And it's just what he went against when launching full thermonuclear on the manager on Monday.

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

Assuming the manager is guilty of every one of the accusations that Desmond is claiming he's guilty of, then it is reasonable to inquire why had been the coach not dismissed?

Desmond has charged him of spinning information in open forums that did not tally with the facts.

He says Rodgers' statements "have contributed to a toxic atmosphere around the club and encouraged hostility towards individuals of the executive team and the directors. Some of the abuse aimed at them, and at their loved ones, has been entirely unjustified and unacceptable."

What an remarkable charge, that is. Lawyers might be mobilising as we speak.

'Rodgers' Ambition Conflicted with the Club's Model Once More'

Looking back to better days, they were tight, the two men. Rodgers praised the shareholder at every turn, thanked him whenever possible. Rodgers deferred to Dermot and, really, to no one other.

This was the figure who took the criticism when his returned occurred, after the previous manager.

It was the most divisive hiring, the return of the returning hero for some supporters or, as some other Celtic fans would have put it, the arrival of the unapologetic figure, who departed in the difficulty for another club.

Desmond had Rodgers' support. Over time, the manager turned on the persuasion, achieved the victories and the honors, and an fragile peace with the fans turned into a love-in once more.

There was always - always - going to be a moment when Rodgers' goals clashed with Celtic's business model, though.

It happened in his first incarnation and it transpired again, with bells on, recently. Rodgers publicly commented about the slow way the team conducted their player acquisitions, the endless delay for prospects to be landed, then missed, as was too often the situation as far as he was believed.

Repeatedly he spoke about the need for what he termed "flexibility" in the transfer window. The fans agreed with him.

Despite the club spent unprecedented sums of money in a twelve-month period on the expensive one signing, the costly another player and the £6m further acquisition - all of whom have performed well so far, with Idah already having left - the manager demanded more and more and, often, he expressed this in public.

He set a controversy about a lack of cohesion inside the team and then walked away. When asked about his comments at his next news conference he would typically minimize it and nearly contradict what he said.

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

A few months back there was a report in a newspaper that purportedly originated from a insider close to the club. It said that the manager was damaging the team with his public outbursts and that his true aim was orchestrating his departure plan.

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

Supporters were enraged. They now viewed him as akin to a martyr who might be removed on his shield because his directors did not support his plans to bring triumph.

This disclosure was poisonous, of course, and it was meant to harm Rodgers, which it accomplished. He called for an investigation and for the guilty person to be dismissed. Whether there was a probe then we learned nothing further about it.

At that point it was plain Rodgers was losing the backing of the individuals in charge.

The frequent {gripes