Merely a quarter of an hour following the club issued the announcement of their manager's surprising resignation via a perfunctory five-paragraph statement, the howitzer arrived, from Dermot Desmond, with clear signs in apparent fury.
In an extensive statement, major shareholder Dermot Desmond savaged his old chum.
This individual he persuaded to join the team when their rivals were gaining ground in that period and needed putting in their place. Plus the figure he again turned to after Ange Postecoglou departed to another club in the summer of 2023.
Such was the ferocity of Desmond's takedown, the jaw-dropping return of Martin O'Neill was almost an secondary note.
Two decades after his departure from the organization, and after a large part of his recent life was dedicated to an unending circuit of appearances and the playing of all his old hits at Celtic, Martin O'Neill is returned in the manager's seat.
For now - and maybe for a time. Based on comments he has said lately, O'Neill has been eager to get another job. He'll view this role as the ultimate chance, a gift from the Celtic Gods, a homecoming to the place where he experienced such success and adulation.
Would he relinquish it readily? It seems unlikely. Celtic might well make a call to sound out their ex-manager, but the new appointment will serve as a soothing presence for the time being.
O'Neill's reappearance - as surreal as it may be - can be set aside because the most significant shocking development was the brutal manner the shareholder described Rodgers.
It was a full-blooded attempt at defamation, a branding of him as untrustful, a source of falsehoods, a spreader of misinformation; divisive, deceptive and unacceptable. "One individual's wish for self-preservation at the expense of others," stated he.
For somebody who values decorum and places great store in dealings being conducted with confidentiality, if not outright privacy, this was a further example of how abnormal things have grown at the club.
The major figure, the organization's most powerful presence, moves in the margins. The absentee totem, the individual with the power to take all the major calls he pleases without having the obligation of explaining them in any open setting.
He does not participate in team AGMs, dispatching his offspring, his son, instead. He seldom, if ever, gives media talks about the team unless they're glowing in nature. And even then, he's slow to communicate.
He has been known on an occasion or two to defend the organization with confidential missives to news outlets, but nothing is made in public.
It's exactly how he's wanted it to be. And that's just what he went against when going all-out attack on Rodgers on Monday.
The official line from the club is that Rodgers stepped down, but reviewing Desmond's invective, carefully, one must question why he allow it to get such a critical point?
If the manager is guilty of every one of the things that the shareholder is claiming he's responsible for, then it's fair to ask why had been the coach not removed?
He has charged him of spinning things in open forums that did not tally with the facts.
He says Rodgers' words "have contributed to a hostile atmosphere around the club and encouraged animosity 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."
What an extraordinary allegation, indeed. Lawyers might be preparing as we speak.
Looking back to better times, they were close, the two men. The manager lauded Desmond at every turn, thanked him every chance. Brendan deferred to Dermot and, truly, to nobody else.
It was the figure who drew the heat when Rodgers' returned occurred, after the previous manager.
This marked the most divisive hiring, the return of the prodigal son for some supporters or, as other Celtic fans would have described it, the return of the shameless one, who departed in the difficulty for another club.
The shareholder had his support. Over time, the manager turned on the charm, delivered the wins and the honors, and an fragile truce with the fans became a love-in once more.
There was always - always - going to be a moment when his goals clashed with the club's business model, however.
It happened in his first incarnation and it happened once more, with bells on, recently. He publicly commented about the slow process the team went about their transfer business, the interminable delay for prospects to be landed, then missed, as was frequently the situation as far as he was concerned.
Repeatedly he stated about the need for what he called "flexibility" in the market. Supporters concurred with him.
Despite the club spent unprecedented sums of funds in a calendar year on the £11m Arne Engels, the costly another player and the significant further acquisition - none of whom have performed well so far, with Idah already having left - the manager pushed for increased resources and, often, he did it in public.
He planted a bomb about a internal disunity inside the team and then distanced himself. Upon questioning about his remarks at his subsequent news conference he would usually downplay it and almost contradict what he stated.
Lack of cohesion? No, no, everybody is aligned, he'd say. It appeared like Rodgers was playing a risky strategy.
Earlier this year there was a story in a newspaper that purportedly came from a source associated with the organization. It claimed 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 there and he was engineering his way out, that was the tone of the story.
Supporters were enraged. They now saw him as similar to a sacrificial figure who might be carried out on his shield because his board members did not back his vision to achieve success.
This disclosure was poisonous, naturally, and it was intended to hurt Rodgers, which it did. He called for an inquiry and for the responsible individual to be removed. Whether there was a examination then we learned nothing further about it.
By then it was clear Rodgers was shedding the backing of the individuals in charge.
The frequent {gripes
A digital artist and writer passionate about blending technology with creative expression in everyday life.
