The Way Irretrievable Collapse Led to a Savage Parting for Rodgers & Celtic

Just fifteen minutes following the club released the announcement of Brendan Rodgers' shock departure via a perfunctory short communication, the bombshell arrived, from Dermot Desmond, with clear signs in apparent fury.

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

The man he persuaded to come to the team when their rivals were getting uppity in 2016 and required being back in a box. Plus the figure he again turned to after Ange Postecoglou departed to Tottenham in the summer of 2023.

So intense was the severity of his takedown, the astonishing return of the former boss was almost an after-thought.

Two decades after his departure from the club, and after much of his recent life was dedicated to an unending circuit of appearances and the playing of all his past successes at Celtic, O'Neill is back in the dugout.

For now - and perhaps for a while. Considering things he has said lately, he has been keen to secure a new position. He'll see this one as the ultimate opportunity, a present from the Celtic Gods, a homecoming to the environment where he experienced such glory and adulation.

Will he give it up readily? You wouldn't have thought so. Celtic could possibly reach out to contact Postecoglou, but the new appointment will serve as a balm for the time being.

'Full-blooded Attempt at Character Assassination

The new manager's return - however strange as it is - can be parked because the most significant shocking development was the harsh manner Desmond wrote of Rodgers.

It was a forceful endeavor at character assassination, a labeling of Rodgers as untrustful, a source of untruths, a disseminator of falsehoods; divisive, misleading and unjustifiable. "One individual's desire for self-preservation at the expense of others," wrote Desmond.

For a person who prizes decorum and sets high importance in business being done with confidentiality, if not outright privacy, this was another illustration of how unusual things have grown at the club.

The major figure, the club's most powerful figure, operates in the background. The remote leader, the one with the power to take all the major calls he pleases without having the responsibility of explaining them in any open setting.

He never participate in team annual meetings, dispatching his offspring, Ross, in his place. He rarely, if ever, gives media talks about the team unless they're hagiographic in tone. And still, he's reluctant to communicate.

There have been instances on an rare moment to support the club with confidential messages to news outlets, but no statement is made in the open.

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

The directive from the club is that Rodgers stepped down, but reviewing his invective, carefully, you have to wonder why he permit it to reach such a critical point?

If Rodgers is culpable of every one of the accusations that Desmond is claiming he's guilty of, then it is reasonable to ask why was the manager not dismissed?

He has charged him of distorting things in public that did not tally with reality.

He says his words "have contributed to a toxic atmosphere around the team and fuelled animosity towards individuals of the management and the board. Some of the criticism directed at them, and at their families, has been entirely unwarranted and improper."

What an remarkable allegation, indeed. Lawyers might be preparing as we discuss.

His Aspirations Conflicted with the Club's Strategy Again

Looking back to better times, they were close, Dermot and Brendan. Rodgers praised Desmond at every turn, thanked him every chance. Rodgers deferred to him and, really, to nobody else.

This was Desmond who drew the heat when Rodgers' returned occurred, after the previous manager.

This marked the most controversial hiring, the reappearance of the prodigal son for a few or, as some other supporters would have described it, the return of the shameless one, who departed in the difficulty for Leicester.

The shareholder had his back. Over time, the manager turned on the persuasion, delivered the wins and the trophies, and an fragile truce with the supporters turned into a love-in again.

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

It happened in his initial tenure and it happened again, with bells on, recently. He publicly commented about the sluggish process Celtic conducted their player acquisitions, the endless waiting for targets to be secured, then not landed, as was too often the case as far as he was concerned.

Repeatedly he stated about the necessity for what he termed "flexibility" in the transfer window. Supporters agreed with him.

Even when the club spent unprecedented sums of money in a twelve-month period on the £11m one signing, the £9m Adam Idah and the significant Auston Trusty - all of whom have cut it to date, with Idah already having left - Rodgers demanded increased resources and, often, he expressed this in openly.

He set a bomb about a internal disunity inside the club and then distanced himself. Upon questioning about his remarks at his next media briefing he would typically downplay it and nearly contradict what he said.

Internal issues? Not at all, all are united, he'd claim. It looked like he was engaging in a risky game.

A few months back there was a story in a newspaper that allegedly came from a insider associated with the organization. It said that the manager was harming the team with his open criticisms and that his real motivation was managing his exit strategy.

He desired not to be there and he was engineering his exit, that was the tone of the story.

Supporters were enraged. They then viewed him as akin to a sacrificial figure who might be removed on his shield because his directors did not back his plans to achieve success.

The leak was damaging, naturally, and it was intended to harm Rodgers, which it accomplished. He called for an investigation 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 backing of the individuals in charge.

The frequent {gripes