The Way Irretrievable Collapse Resulted in a Brutal Parting for Rodgers & Celtic FC

Merely fifteen minutes after Celtic released the news of Brendan Rodgers' shock resignation via a brief short communication, the bombshell landed, courtesy of Dermot Desmond, with whiskers twitching in apparent fury.

In 551-words, major shareholder Dermot Desmond eviscerated his former ally.

This individual he persuaded to come to the club when Rangers were gaining ground in 2016 and needed putting in their place. And the figure he again turned to after Ange Postecoglou left for another club in the summer of 2023.

Such was the ferocity of Desmond's critique, the jaw-dropping return of Martin O'Neill was almost an after-thought.

Twenty years after his exit from the club, and after a large part of his latter years was dedicated to an continuous series of public speaking engagements and the playing of all his old hits at the team, Martin O'Neill is back in the dugout.

Currently - and maybe for a time. Considering things he has said lately, he has been eager to secure another job. He will view this one as the perfect opportunity, a gift from the club's legacy, a homecoming to the environment where he enjoyed such success and adulation.

Would he give it up easily? You wouldn't have thought so. Celtic might well make a call to contact Postecoglou, but the new appointment will act as a balm for the moment.

All-out Attempt at Reputation Destruction'

The new manager's reappearance - as surreal as it is - can be parked because the biggest 'wow!' moment was the brutal way Desmond described Rodgers.

This constituted a forceful endeavor at character assassination, a branding of Rodgers as untrustful, a perpetrator of falsehoods, a disseminator of falsehoods; divisive, misleading and unjustifiable. "A single person's wish for self-preservation at the expense of everyone else," stated he.

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

The major figure, the organization's dominant figure, operates in the background. The absentee totem, the one with the authority to take all the major calls he wants without having the obligation of explaining them in any public forum.

He never attend club annual meetings, sending his son, Ross, in his place. He rarely, if ever, does interviews about Celtic unless they're hagiographic in tone. And even then, he's slow to speak out.

He has been known on an occasion or two to defend the organization with private messages to media organisations, but nothing is made in public.

This is precisely how he's preferred it to be. And it's just what he contradicted when going all-out attack on Rodgers on Monday.

The official line from the team is that Rodgers resigned, but reading 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 Desmond is alleging he's guilty of, then it is reasonable to ask why had been the coach not dismissed?

Desmond has accused him of distorting things in public that did not tally with the facts.

He says his statements "played a part to a toxic atmosphere around the club and fuelled hostility towards individuals of the executive team and the directors. A portion of the abuse aimed at them, and at their loved ones, has been completely unwarranted and improper."

Such an extraordinary allegation, that is. Legal representatives might be preparing as we speak.

His Aspirations Clashed with Celtic's Strategy Once More'

To return to happier days, they were tight, Dermot and Brendan. Rodgers praised the shareholder at every turn, expressed gratitude to him whenever possible. Brendan respected Dermot and, really, to nobody else.

It was the figure who took the heat when Rodgers' comeback happened, after the previous manager.

It was the most controversial hiring, the reappearance of the returning hero for a few or, as other Celtic fans would have put it, the arrival of the shameless one, who departed in the difficulty for Leicester.

Desmond had Rodgers' back. Over time, the manager employed the persuasion, achieved the wins and the honors, and an uneasy peace with the supporters turned into a love-in once more.

There was always - always - going to be a moment when Rodgers' ambition came in contact with Celtic's business model, however.

This occurred in his first incarnation and it happened once more, with bells on, recently. He spoke openly about the slow way Celtic conducted their transfer business, the endless delay for targets to be secured, then not landed, as was too often the situation as far as he was believed.

Time and again he spoke about the need for what he called "agility" in the market. Supporters agreed with him.

Even when the organization splurged record amounts of funds in a calendar year on the £11m Arne Engels, the costly another player and the significant Auston Trusty - none of whom have cut it to date, with Idah already having departed - Rodgers demanded more and more and, often, he expressed this in openly.

He set a bomb about a lack of cohesion within the club and then walked away. Upon questioning about his remarks at his next media briefing he would usually downplay it and nearly reverse what he stated.

Lack of cohesion? Not at all, everybody is aligned, he'd claim. It looked like Rodgers was playing a dangerous strategy.

A few months back there was a report in a newspaper that purportedly came from a insider close to the organization. It claimed that Rodgers was damaging Celtic with his public outbursts and that his true aim was orchestrating his departure plan.

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

The fans were angered. They now saw him as akin to a martyr who might be carried out on his honor because his board members did not support his plans to achieve success.

This disclosure was poisonous, naturally, and it was meant to harm Rodgers, which it accomplished. He called for an inquiry and for the responsible individual to be dismissed. If there was a examination then we learned no more about it.

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

The frequent {gripes