The Way Irretrievable Breakdown Led to a Brutal Parting for Brendan Rodgers & Celtic

Just a quarter of an hour after the club issued the news of Brendan Rodgers' surprising departure via a brief short communication, the howitzer arrived, courtesy of the major shareholder, with whiskers twitching in obvious fury.

In 551-words, key investor Desmond savaged his former ally.

The man he convinced to join the club when their rivals were getting uppity in that period and required being in their place. And the figure he once more relied on after the previous manager left for another club in the recent offseason.

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

Two decades after his departure from the organization, and after a large part of his recent life was dedicated to an unending series of appearances and the performance of all his past successes at Celtic, Martin O'Neill is back in the manager's seat.

Currently - and perhaps for a while. Considering things he has expressed lately, he has been eager to secure another job. He'll see this one as the ultimate chance, a gift from the Celtic Gods, a return to the place where he experienced such glory and adulation.

Would he give it up readily? You wouldn't have thought so. The club might well reach out to contact Postecoglou, but the new appointment will act as a soothing presence for the moment.

All-out Effort at Character Assassination

O'Neill's return - as surreal as it is - can be parked because the most significant 'wow!' development was the brutal manner Desmond wrote of the former manager.

It was a forceful endeavor at defamation, a branding of him as deceitful, a source of falsehoods, a spreader of falsehoods; disruptive, deceptive and unacceptable. "One individual's desire for self-preservation at the expense of everyone else," wrote he.

For a person who prizes decorum and sets high importance in business being done with confidentiality, if not complete secrecy, here was a further example of how abnormal situations have grown at Celtic.

Desmond, the organization's dominant presence, operates in the margins. The remote leader, the individual with the authority to take all the important calls he pleases without having the responsibility of explaining them in any public forum.

He never participate in club AGMs, dispatching his offspring, his son, instead. He seldom, if ever, gives media talks about Celtic unless they're hagiographic in tone. And even then, he's reluctant to communicate.

He has been known on an occasion or two to support the organization with private messages to media organisations, but no statement is made in public.

It's exactly how he's preferred it to remain. And that's just what he contradicted when launching all-out attack on Rodgers on that day.

The directive from the team is that he stepped down, but reviewing his criticism, carefully, one must question why he permit it to get such a critical point?

If the manager is guilty of every one of the things that the shareholder is alleging he's guilty of, then it's fair to ask why had been the manager not removed?

He has charged him of distorting things in open forums that were inconsistent with reality.

He says Rodgers' statements "played a part to a hostile environment around the club and fuelled animosity towards individuals of the executive team and the directors. A portion of the criticism directed at them, and at their loved ones, has been entirely unwarranted and unacceptable."

What an extraordinary allegation, indeed. Legal representatives might be preparing as we speak.

His Aspirations Clashed with the Club's Strategy Once More'

Looking back to better days, they were tight, Dermot and Brendan. The manager praised Desmond at every turn, thanked him every chance. Brendan deferred to Dermot and, truly, to no one other.

It was the figure who took the criticism when Rodgers' returned happened, post-Postecoglou.

It was the most divisive appointment, the reappearance of the prodigal son for some supporters or, as other supporters would have put it, the return of the unapologetic figure, who left them in the difficulty for another club.

The shareholder had Rodgers' back. Gradually, the manager turned on the persuasion, achieved the wins and the trophies, and an fragile truce with the fans turned into a affectionate relationship again.

There was always - consistently - going to be a point when Rodgers' goals clashed with the club's business model, however.

It happened in his initial tenure and it happened once more, with added intensity, over the last year. Rodgers publicly commented about the slow process the team conducted their transfer business, the interminable delay for targets to be secured, then not landed, as was frequently the case as far as he was believed.

Repeatedly he stated about the need for what he termed "flexibility" in the market. The fans agreed with him.

Despite the club splurged unprecedented sums of money in a calendar year on the expensive Arne Engels, the £9m another player and the £6m Auston Trusty - all of whom have cut it so far, with one since having departed - the manager pushed for more and more and, often, he did it in openly.

He planted a bomb about a internal disunity inside the club and then distanced himself. When asked about his remarks at his subsequent news conference he would typically downplay it and almost reverse what he stated.

Internal issues? No, no, all are united, he'd say. It looked like Rodgers was playing a dangerous game.

A few months back there was a story in a newspaper that purportedly originated from a source close to the organization. It claimed that the manager was harming the team with his open criticisms and that his true aim was managing his exit strategy.

He desired not to be present and he was arranging his way out, this was the implication of the story.

Supporters were angered. They then viewed him as akin to a martyr who might be carried out on his honor because his directors wouldn't back his plans to bring triumph.

This disclosure was damaging, of course, and it was meant to harm him, which it accomplished. He called for an investigation and for the guilty person to be removed. If there was a probe then we learned nothing further about it.

By then it was clear Rodgers was losing the backing of the individuals in charge.

The frequent {gripes