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Merely fifteen minutes following Celtic issued the announcement of their manager's surprising resignation via a brief five-paragraph communication, the howitzer arrived, from the major shareholder, with whiskers twitching in apparent anger.

In an extensive statement, major shareholder Dermot Desmond eviscerated his old chum.

This individual he persuaded to join the club when their rivals were gaining ground in that period and required being back in a box. And the figure he once more turned to after Ange Postecoglou left for Tottenham in the recent offseason.

Such was the severity of his takedown, the jaw-dropping comeback of the former boss was practically an after-thought.

Two decades after his exit from the organization, and after much of his recent life was given over to an unending circuit of public speaking engagements and the playing of all his old hits at the team, O'Neill is returned in the manager's seat.

Currently - and maybe for a while. Based on things he has expressed lately, O'Neill has been eager to get a new position. He will see this role as the ultimate opportunity, a present from the club's legacy, a return to the place where he experienced such glory and praise.

Will he relinquish it easily? It seems unlikely. The club could possibly reach out to sound out their ex-manager, but the new appointment will act as a soothing presence for the time being.

'Full-blooded Attempt at Character Assassination

The new manager's return - as surreal as it may be - can be set aside because the most significant shocking development was the brutal manner the shareholder wrote of Rodgers.

It was a forceful attempt at character assassination, a branding of Rodgers as deceitful, a source of falsehoods, a disseminator of misinformation; divisive, deceptive and unacceptable. "A single person's wish for self-preservation at the cost of everyone else," wrote he.

For a person who prizes propriety and sets high importance in business being conducted with confidentiality, if not complete privacy, here was another example of how unusual things have grown at the club.

Desmond, the club's most powerful figure, moves in the background. The remote leader, the one with the power to take all the major calls he wants without having the obligation of explaining them in any public forum.

He never participate in team annual meetings, dispatching his son, his son, in his place. He seldom, if ever, does interviews about the team unless they're glowing in nature. And still, he's slow to speak out.

He has been known on an occasion or two to defend the club with private messages to media organisations, but nothing is made in the open.

It's exactly how he's preferred it to be. And that's exactly what he went against when launching full thermonuclear on Rodgers on Monday.

The official line from the club is that he resigned, but reviewing his criticism, carefully, one must question why he permit it to reach such a critical point?

If Rodgers is guilty of every one of the things that the shareholder is claiming he's responsible for, then it is reasonable to inquire why was the manager not removed?

He has accused him of distorting things in public that were inconsistent with the facts.

He claims Rodgers' words "played a part to a toxic environment around the club and fuelled animosity towards individuals of the management and the directors. Some of the criticism directed at them, and at their families, has been entirely unwarranted and improper."

Such an remarkable allegation, that is. Legal representatives might be mobilising as we discuss.

His Aspirations Conflicted with Celtic's Model Once More'

Looking back to happier days, they were close, Dermot and Brendan. The manager lauded the shareholder at all opportunities, thanked him every chance. Rodgers respected him and, truly, to no one other.

It was Desmond who drew the heat when his returned occurred, post-Postecoglou.

This marked the most controversial appointment, the return of the prodigal son for some supporters or, as other Celtic fans would have put it, the arrival of the shameless one, who left them in the difficulty for Leicester.

Desmond had Rodgers' back. Over time, Rodgers turned on the persuasion, delivered the wins and the honors, and an uneasy peace with the fans turned into a affectionate relationship again.

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

It happened in his initial tenure and it transpired once more, with bells on, recently. He spoke openly about the sluggish process the team conducted their transfer business, the endless delay for targets to be secured, then not landed, as was too often the case as far as he was believed.

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

Even when the club spent unprecedented sums of money in a calendar year on the expensive one signing, the £9m another player and the £6m Auston Trusty - all of whom have cut it to date, with one already having departed - the manager demanded increased resources and, oftentimes, he expressed this in public.

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

Internal issues? No, no, everybody is aligned, he'd say. It appeared like Rodgers was engaging in a risky strategy.

Earlier this year there was a report in a publication that allegedly came from a insider associated with the organization. It said that Rodgers was harming Celtic with his public outbursts and that his true aim was managing his departure plan.

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

Supporters were angered. They now saw him as similar to a sacrificial figure who might be removed on his honor because his board members did not support his plans to achieve triumph.

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

By then it was plain the manager was shedding the backing of the individuals above him.

The regular {gripes