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Just a quarter of an hour after the club released the announcement of Brendan Rodgers' shock resignation via a perfunctory short communication, the howitzer landed, from the major shareholder, with whiskers twitching in apparent anger.

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

The man he persuaded to come to the club when Rangers were getting uppity in 2016 and needed putting back in a box. Plus the figure he again turned to after Ange Postecoglou left for another club in the recent offseason.

So intense was the severity of his critique, the jaw-dropping return of Martin O'Neill was almost an secondary note.

Two decades after his exit from the organization, and after much of his recent life was dedicated to an continuous series of appearances and the performance of all his past successes at Celtic, Martin O'Neill is back in the dugout.

For now - and maybe for a time. Based on comments he has said lately, he has been eager to secure a new position. He'll view this one as the perfect chance, a gift from the Celtic Gods, a homecoming to the place where he enjoyed such glory and praise.

Will he relinquish it readily? It seems unlikely. The club might well make a call to sound out Postecoglou, but O'Neill will serve as a soothing presence for the moment.

'Full-blooded Attempt at Reputation Destruction'

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

This constituted a forceful endeavor at character assassination, a branding of Rodgers as untrustful, a source of untruths, a disseminator of falsehoods; disruptive, deceptive and unacceptable. "A single person's wish for self-interest at the expense of others," stated Desmond.

For somebody who prizes decorum and sets high importance in dealings being conducted with confidentiality, if not complete secrecy, this was a further illustration of how unusual situations have grown at Celtic.

The major figure, the organization's most powerful figure, moves in the margins. The remote leader, the one with the power to take all the major decisions he wants without having the responsibility of explaining them in any open setting.

He does not attend club AGMs, dispatching his son, Ross, instead. He seldom, if ever, gives media talks about the team unless they're glowing in nature. And still, he's slow to speak out.

There have been instances on an rare moment to support the club with confidential missives to news outlets, but no statement is heard in public.

This is precisely how he's preferred it to remain. And that's exactly what he went against when going full thermonuclear on the manager on Monday.

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

Assuming the manager is culpable of all of the things that the shareholder is claiming he's guilty of, then it is reasonable to ask why was the manager not dismissed?

Desmond has charged him of spinning things in public that did not tally with reality.

He claims his statements "played a part to a hostile atmosphere around the club and fuelled hostility towards members of the executive team and the board. A portion of the abuse directed at them, and at their families, has been completely unwarranted and improper."

What an remarkable charge, indeed. Legal representatives might be mobilising as we speak.

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

To return to happier days, they were tight, Dermot and Brendan. Rodgers praised the shareholder at all opportunities, expressed gratitude to him every chance. Rodgers deferred to Dermot and, truly, to no one other.

It was Desmond who drew the heat when his returned happened, after the previous manager.

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

Desmond had his back. Gradually, the manager turned on the persuasion, achieved the victories and the trophies, and an uneasy truce with the fans became a love-in again.

There was always - always - going to be a point when his goals clashed with Celtic's business model, however.

It happened in his first incarnation and it happened once more, with added intensity, recently. He spoke openly about the slow way Celtic went about their transfer business, the endless delay for prospects to be secured, then not landed, as was too often the situation as far as he was concerned.

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

Despite the organization splurged record amounts of funds 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 left - Rodgers demanded increased resources and, often, he did it in public.

He planted a controversy about a internal disunity within the team and then walked away. Upon questioning about his comments at his next news conference he would typically downplay it and almost reverse what he stated.

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

Earlier this year there was a story in a publication that purportedly came from a insider close to the organization. It said that the manager was damaging the team with his open criticisms and that his real motivation was orchestrating his exit strategy.

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

The fans were angered. They now viewed him as similar to a martyr who might be removed on his honor because his board members did not back his plans to bring success.

This disclosure was damaging, of course, and it was meant to hurt him, which it accomplished. He demanded for an inquiry and for the responsible individual to be dismissed. If there was a probe then we heard no more about it.

At that point it was clear Rodgers was shedding the backing of the people above him.

The regular {gripes