🔗 Share this article

Just a quarter of an hour after Celtic released the news of Brendan Rodgers' shock departure via a perfunctory short communication, the howitzer landed, from Dermot Desmond, with clear signs in apparent fury.

Through an extensive statement, key investor Desmond eviscerated his old chum.

The man he convinced to join the team when their rivals were getting uppity in that period and required being back in a box. And the man he again relied on after the previous manager departed to another club in the summer of 2023.

So intense was the ferocity of his critique, the jaw-dropping comeback of Martin O'Neill was practically an after-thought.

Two decades after his departure from the organization, and after a large part of his latter years was given over to an unending circuit of appearances and the playing of all his past successes at the team, Martin O'Neill is back in the dugout.

Currently - and maybe for a while. Considering things he has expressed lately, O'Neill has been eager to secure another job. He will view this role as the ultimate opportunity, a present from the Celtic Gods, a return to the place where he experienced such success and adulation.

Will he give it up easily? You wouldn't have thought so. The club could possibly reach out to sound out Postecoglou, but O'Neill will serve as a soothing presence for the moment.

All-out Attempt at Character Assassination

O'Neill's return - however strange as it may be - can be parked because the most significant shocking development was the harsh way the shareholder described Rodgers.

This constituted a forceful endeavor at character assassination, a branding of Rodgers as deceitful, a source of untruths, a disseminator of misinformation; divisive, misleading and unjustifiable. "A single person's desire for self-preservation at the expense of others," wrote Desmond.

For somebody who prizes propriety and places great store in dealings being conducted with discretion, if not outright secrecy, this was another example of how abnormal situations have become at the club.

Desmond, the organization's dominant figure, moves in the margins. The remote leader, the individual with the power to make all the major decisions he pleases without having the responsibility of justifying them in any open setting.

He never participate in team AGMs, dispatching his son, his son, instead. He seldom, if ever, does interviews about Celtic unless they're glowing in nature. And still, he's slow to communicate.

He has been known on an occasion or two to support the organization with confidential messages to media organisations, but nothing is heard in the open.

It's exactly how he's preferred it to be. And it's exactly what he went against when going all-out attack on Rodgers on that day.

The official line from the team is that he resigned, but reviewing Desmond's criticism, carefully, one must question why he allow it to reach such a critical point?

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

He has accused him of spinning information in open forums that were inconsistent with reality.

He claims his words "have contributed to a hostile atmosphere around the team and encouraged hostility towards individuals of the management and the board. Some of the abuse directed at them, and at their loved ones, has been completely unjustified and improper."

Such an extraordinary charge, indeed. Legal representatives might be mobilising as we discuss.

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

Looking back to happier times, they were tight, Dermot and Brendan. Rodgers praised the shareholder at all opportunities, thanked him whenever possible. Brendan respected him and, truly, to nobody else.

It was Desmond who drew the heat when Rodgers' comeback occurred, post-Postecoglou.

It was the most divisive appointment, the return of the prodigal son for a few or, as other Celtic fans would have put it, the arrival of the unapologetic figure, who departed in the difficulty for Leicester.

Desmond had Rodgers' support. Gradually, Rodgers turned on the persuasion, delivered the wins and the honors, and an fragile peace with the supporters turned into a affectionate relationship once more.

It was inevitable - always - going to be a moment when Rodgers' goals clashed with the club's business model, however.

This occurred in his first incarnation and it transpired once more, with bells on, over the last year. He spoke openly about the slow process Celtic went about their transfer business, the endless delay for prospects to be landed, then not landed, as was too often the case as far as he was concerned.

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

Despite the club splurged record amounts of funds in a twelve-month period on the expensive Arne Engels, the costly another player and the significant further acquisition - all of whom have cut it so far, with Idah already having departed - the manager pushed for more and more and, oftentimes, he expressed this in public.

He planted a controversy about a internal disunity inside the club and then distanced himself. Upon questioning about his comments at his next media briefing he would usually downplay it and almost reverse what he stated.

Lack of cohesion? No, no, all are united, he'd claim. It appeared like Rodgers was playing a risky strategy.

A few months back there was a story in a publication that allegedly originated from a source associated with the club. It claimed that Rodgers 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 arranging his way out, this was the tone of the story.

The fans were enraged. They now saw him as akin to a sacrificial figure who might be carried out on his honor because his directors did not support his plans to achieve triumph.

This disclosure was poisonous, of course, and it was meant to harm him, which it did. He demanded for an inquiry and for the guilty person to be dismissed. Whether there was a probe then we heard no more about it.

By then it was clear Rodgers was shedding the backing of the people in charge.

The regular {gripes