🔗 Share this article

Merely fifteen minutes following the club released the announcement of their manager's shock departure via a brief five-paragraph statement, the bombshell landed, courtesy of Dermot Desmond, with clear signs in obvious fury.

In 551-words, major shareholder Desmond savaged his former ally.

This individual he convinced to come to the club when Rangers were getting uppity in that period and needed putting in their place. Plus the figure he once more turned to after the previous manager departed to another club in the recent offseason.

So intense was the ferocity of Desmond's takedown, the jaw-dropping return of Martin O'Neill was practically an after-thought.

Twenty years after his departure from the club, and after much of his latter years was dedicated to an unending series of appearances and the playing of all his past successes at the team, O'Neill is returned in the manager's seat.

For now - and maybe for a time. Based on comments he has said recently, O'Neill has been eager to secure a new position. He'll view this role as the perfect opportunity, a present from the club's legacy, a return to the environment where he enjoyed such success and adulation.

Would he give it up readily? You wouldn't have thought so. The club might well make a call to sound out Postecoglou, but O'Neill will act as a soothing presence for the moment.

'Full-blooded Effort at Reputation Destruction'

The new manager's return - however strange as it is - can be set aside because the biggest shocking development was the harsh manner Desmond wrote of the former manager.

This constituted a forceful attempt at defamation, a branding of Rodgers as deceitful, a source of untruths, a spreader of misinformation; divisive, misleading and unacceptable. "One individual's wish for self-interest at the expense of others," stated Desmond.

For a person who prizes decorum and places great store in business being conducted with confidentiality, if not complete secrecy, here was a further example of how unusual things have become at Celtic.

Desmond, the club's most powerful presence, operates in the margins. The absentee totem, the individual with the authority to make all the important decisions he pleases without having the obligation of explaining them in any public forum.

He never attend club AGMs, dispatching his offspring, Ross, instead. He seldom, if ever, gives interviews about the team unless they're glowing in tone. And even then, he's reluctant to communicate.

There have been instances on an occasion or two to defend the club with private missives to media organisations, but nothing is heard in public.

It's exactly how he's preferred it to remain. And it's just what he contradicted when going full thermonuclear on Rodgers on that day.

The directive from the team is that Rodgers stepped down, but reviewing Desmond's invective, line by line, one must question why did he allow it to get such a critical point?

If Rodgers is culpable of all of the things that the shareholder is claiming he's guilty of, then it is reasonable to inquire why had been the manager not removed?

Desmond has accused him of distorting information in open forums that were inconsistent with the facts.

He claims Rodgers' statements "played a part to a toxic atmosphere around the team and fuelled hostility towards individuals of the management and the directors. Some of the abuse directed at them, and at their families, has been entirely unwarranted and improper."

Such an extraordinary allegation, that is. Legal representatives might be preparing as we speak.

His Aspirations Clashed with the Club's Model Again

Looking back to better times, they were close, Dermot and Brendan. The manager lauded the shareholder at all opportunities, thanked him whenever possible. Brendan deferred to Dermot and, really, to no one other.

This was the figure who took the heat when his returned occurred, post-Postecoglou.

It was the most divisive appointment, the return of the prodigal son for some supporters or, as other supporters would have described it, the return of the shameless one, who departed in the difficulty for another club.

Desmond had his support. Over time, Rodgers employed the charm, achieved the victories and the honors, and an uneasy peace with the fans became a affectionate relationship once more.

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

It happened in his first incarnation and it happened once more, with added intensity, over the last year. He spoke openly about the sluggish way Celtic conducted their transfer business, the interminable waiting for prospects to be secured, then missed, as was frequently the situation as far as he was concerned.

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

Despite the organization spent record amounts of money in a twelve-month period on the £11m Arne Engels, the costly another player and the significant Auston Trusty - none of whom have cut it so far, with Idah already having left - the manager pushed for more and more and, oftentimes, he did it in openly.

He set a bomb about a lack of cohesion inside the club and then distanced himself. When asked about his remarks at his next media briefing he would typically minimize it and nearly reverse what he said.

Internal issues? Not at all, all are united, he'd say. It looked like he was playing a dangerous game.

A few months back there was a story in a newspaper that allegedly came from a insider close to the organization. It said that the manager was damaging Celtic with his public outbursts and that his real motivation was orchestrating his exit strategy.

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

The fans were enraged. They now saw him as akin to a sacrificial figure who might be removed on his honor because his board members wouldn't support his vision to achieve success.

This disclosure was poisonous, naturally, and it was intended to hurt him, which it did. He demanded for an inquiry and for the responsible individual to be removed. Whether there was a examination then we heard no more about it.

By then it was plain Rodgers was shedding the backing of the people above him.

The regular {gripes