Brendan Rodgers' Celtic return and the missing 12,700 - but no sign of fan protests tells its own story

There have been few more dynamic illustrations of football’s crazily-paved path than the re-unveiling of a Celtic manager four years after he staged a midnight flit to Leicester City.

Was it a dream? The Bobby Ewing-in-the-shower-meme has been doing good business on Twitter.

Actor Patrick Duffy spent a year away from Dallas, playing the goat in an Alice in Wonderland mini-series among other parts, before returning as if nothing had happened. There were grounds for the most militant branch of the show’s fans to charge Duffy with trading immortality for mediocrity although whether banners outlining this perceived betrayal were ever strung up on the pristine white fences leading to Southfork ranch is not recorded.

Brendan Rodgers has a similar credibility problem but is blessed with the chutzpah to ride it out. In a direct message to those supporters who still need to be convinced, with fans’ group the Green Brigade maintaining their stance that he is guilty of an act of treachery, Rodgers told around 300 fans outside Celtic Park at just before 6pm yesterday that he’d see the doubters "back here in May”, the inference being that he’ll be just as successful this time around.

Brendan Rodgers addresses a gathering of around 300 Celtic fans outside the stadium. (Photo by Craig Williamson / SNS Group)

The trouble is that in order to even maintain the current rate of success, domestically at least, Rodgers needs to win everything. He will back himself and why not – Celtic won all seven domestic competitions they entered under him.

Other than Rangers being an assuredly better equipped rival, the landscape hasn't altered that much. The top flight is only one club different to 2018-19, his last season. Ross County replace Hamilton Accies. A quirk is that Rodgers will have to wait to taste his first experience of Tannadice.

Dundee United were not in the top flight in his first spell here and are again absent. He said he was looking forward to returning to some familiar venues and “battling with the media, that was always good fun”. The media might not be his biggest problem. It’s the club’s own fans, particularly the hardcore. No one disrespects Celtic, is their uncomplicated view of life. Rodgers was one of their own and so his departure edged towards the Mo Johnston end of the scale charting unacceptable exits.

It's not the view of the majority, one contends. Alan, a fan since attending a friendly against Arsenal in the early 1990s, is more realistic. “It was a bitter pill at the time,” he said. “But the guy is here to win football matches. These things happen in football. You saw the level of managers being quoted as coming in, there was nowhere near the calibre Brendan Rodgers brings.”

Brendan Rodgers addressed a gathering of around 300 Celtic fans outside the stadium. (Photo by Craig Foy / SNS Group)

The Green Brigade recently tweeted out a photo of the banner unveiled at Tynecastle Park the day after Rodgers left for Leicester in a seeming reaffirmation of their view that he had "traded immortality for mediocrity". It was all, according to Alan, “getting very petty”.

No one came out on a grey day in Glasgow yesterday to protest, which seemed to say something. Celtic TV presenter Gerry McCulloch thanked the fans for their patience when introducing Rodgers at just before 6pm. “He’s been a very busy man but, when he heard you were all here, he wanted to come out and speak to you,” he told them. Rodgers very deliberately avoided saying sorry for leaving Celtic – indeed, he had already told reporters he had no regrets – but he did apologise for hurting the fans.

Rodgers’ assignments yesterday presented a different challenge to the first interview he had given since his return on the club’s own television channel. Supporter discord had not been broached amid more on-message tales about long lunches with skipper Callum McGregor in Majorca and how “natural” it felt being back in Glasgow.

“God bless you Brendan!” one fan called out as he entered Celtic Park again at around 3pm. “Okay,” he replied. He seemed slightly discombobulated by the intense assault on the senses often triggered by returning to a place where one has spent such a formative chapter. It must have felt a bit like returning to school, with Rodgers cast as the slightly chastened former star pupil.

LONDON, ENGLAND - MAY 15: Khun Top, Chairman of Leicester City celebrates with Brendan Rodgers (R), Manager of Leicester City following The Emirates FA Cup Final match between Chelsea and Leicester City at Wembley Stadium on May 15, 2021 in London, England. A limited number of around 21,000 fans, subject to a negative lateral flow test, will be allowed inside Wembley Stadium to watch this year's FA Cup Final as part of a pilot event to trial the return of large crowds to UK venues. (Photo by Matt Childs - Pool/Getty Images)

There was less brouhaha and maybe around 12,700 fewer fans than when he was unveiled first time around in 2016, a couple of days after Hibs had won the Scottish Cup. So many turned up on that occasion that they had to open a stand. They could have fitted yesterday’s turnout into one of the club’s lounges.

The manner of his exit clearly still rankles with some and the fact he very firmly stated he had no regrets about leaving for Leicester City will not appease those already unimpressed by his re-appointment. Rodgers admitted a desire to create some kind of redemptive arc informed his decision to come back.

“I hope I can still have (a good relationship) with the supporters,” he said. “It's natural that when I left, it was a sad moment. I certainly don't regret it but what I do regret is the hurt it caused people. And that's the very reason I'm sat here today.”

He returns with an FA Cup to his name and an expanded family. His wife Charlotte and their three young children – who were all wearing the new Celtic away kit with “Rodgers” on the back – sat a few rows back at the first press conference for broadcast media.

Rodgers handled it all with charm and grace, as you knew he would. The age of Ange and his sometimes-clipped answers is over.

Rodgers is back and, according to him, Celtic are getting an improved version. “I’m a better manager than when I sat here seven years ago, and better, certainly, than four years ago,” said the 50-year-old. One suspects that he will need to be.