🔗 Share this article

Just a quarter of an hour following Celtic released the news of Brendan Rodgers' surprising departure via a brief five-paragraph communication, the howitzer arrived, courtesy of the major shareholder, with clear signs in apparent fury.

Through 551-words, key investor Desmond eviscerated his former ally.

The man he persuaded to come to the club when Rangers were gaining ground in 2016 and needed putting back in a box. Plus the figure he once more turned to after Ange Postecoglou departed to another club in the summer of 2023.

Such was the ferocity of Desmond's critique, the astonishing comeback of the former boss was almost an after-thought.

Twenty years after his exit from the organization, and after much of his latter years was dedicated to an continuous circuit of public speaking engagements and the playing of all his past successes at the team, O'Neill is returned in the dugout.

Currently - and maybe for a while. Considering things he has expressed recently, he has been keen to secure another job. He'll view this one as the perfect opportunity, a gift from the club's legacy, a homecoming to the place where he experienced such success and adulation.

Will he give it up readily? You wouldn't have thought so. The club might well reach out to sound out their ex-manager, but O'Neill will serve as a balm for the time being.

All-out Attempt at Character Assassination

The new manager's reappearance - as surreal as it may be - can be set aside because the most significant shocking development was the harsh manner Desmond described Rodgers.

It was a full-blooded attempt at character assassination, a labeling of Rodgers as untrustful, a perpetrator of untruths, a spreader of falsehoods; divisive, deceptive and unjustifiable. "A single person's wish for self-preservation at the expense of everyone else," stated Desmond.

For a person who prizes decorum and sets high importance in dealings being conducted with discretion, if not outright secrecy, this was another example of how unusual things have become at the club.

The major figure, the club's dominant presence, moves in the background. The absentee totem, the one with the authority to take all the important decisions he pleases without having the obligation of justifying them in any open setting.

He does not attend team annual meetings, dispatching his offspring, Ross, in his place. He seldom, if ever, gives interviews about the team unless they're hagiographic in tone. And even then, he's slow to communicate.

There have been instances on an rare moment to defend the organization with confidential messages to news outlets, but no statement is made in public.

This is precisely how he's preferred it to be. And it's exactly what he went against when launching all-out attack on the manager on that day.

The directive from the club is that Rodgers stepped down, but reviewing Desmond's criticism, line by line, you have to wonder why he permit it to get such a critical point?

If the manager is guilty of every one of the accusations that Desmond is claiming he's responsible for, then it is reasonable to inquire why had been the manager not removed?

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

He says Rodgers' statements "played a part to a hostile environment around the team and encouraged hostility towards members of the management and the directors. Some of the criticism aimed at them, and at their families, has been completely unjustified and unacceptable."

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

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

Looking back to better times, they were tight, the two men. The manager lauded the shareholder at all opportunities, expressed gratitude to him every chance. Brendan deferred to him and, truly, to no one other.

It was Desmond who drew the criticism when Rodgers' comeback happened, post-Postecoglou.

It was the most divisive hiring, the reappearance of the prodigal son for a few or, as some other supporters would have put it, the arrival of the shameless one, who departed in the lurch for another club.

The shareholder had Rodgers' support. Over time, Rodgers employed the charm, achieved the wins and the honors, and an uneasy peace with the fans turned into a affectionate relationship once more.

There was always - consistently - going to be a point when his ambition clashed with Celtic's operational approach, though.

This occurred in his first incarnation and it happened once more, with bells on, recently. Rodgers publicly commented about the sluggish process the team conducted their player acquisitions, the interminable delay for prospects to be secured, then not landed, as was too often the situation as far as he was believed.

Time and again he stated about the need for what he termed "flexibility" in the transfer window. The fans agreed with him.

Even when the organization splurged unprecedented sums of funds in a calendar year on the £11m Arne Engels, the £9m another player and the significant further acquisition - none of whom have performed well to date, with one since having left - Rodgers pushed for more and more and, oftentimes, he expressed this in openly.

He planted a bomb about a lack of cohesion within the team and then walked away. When asked about his remarks at his subsequent media briefing he would usually minimize it and nearly contradict what he stated.

Internal issues? No, no, everybody is aligned, he'd say. It looked like Rodgers was playing a dangerous game.

Earlier this year there was a story in a publication that purportedly originated from a source associated with the club. It said that Rodgers was harming the team with his public outbursts and that his real motivation was managing his exit strategy.

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

The fans were angered. They now saw him as similar to a martyr who might be carried out on his shield because his board members wouldn't back his plans to achieve triumph.

This disclosure was poisonous, naturally, and it was intended to harm him, which it accomplished. He demanded for an inquiry and for the guilty person to be removed. Whether there was a examination then we learned nothing further about it.

By then it was clear Rodgers was losing the support of the individuals above him.

The regular {gripes