Twitter trolls giving GAA a bad name, says Damien Cahalane’s brother

The brother of Damien Cahalane has slammed an anonymous Twitter troll who wrote insulting comments about his sibling following his performance in Sunday’s Munster semi-final defeat to Waterford.

The Cork defender’s younger sibling Conor Cahalane, a minor hurler himself with the county, yesterday hit out at what has been written on the social network about Damien.

Conor highlighted two tweets from one account with a seemingly fake name, adding: “This is a good example of the type of abuse that goes on in the GAA, putting a bad name on the game.”

Cahalane had previously commented: “The abuse inter county players get is unfair considering the amount of commitment that goes into it, too many people are very small minded”.

St Finbarr’s hurler and Castlehaven footballer Cahalane, 22, opted to concentrate on hurling this year having played for both Jimmy Barry-Murphy and Brian Cuthbert’s teams last year.

Earlier this year, Cork captain Anthony Nash spoke of the heavy-handed criticism that came the team’s way following last August’s All-Ireland semi-final defeat to Tipperary.

“Even our own people in Kanturk, you got a few comments, Facebook and Twitter and things like that which isn’t nice to hear, and around the county. The true supporters would never do that, they know we’re always going out to put in 100%.”

Speaking after Sunday’s loss, Cahalane insisted Cork would bounce back in the qualifiers. “It’s a close group in the dressing room and we will pull ourselves together.”

He takes heart from having seen the likes of Clare and Cork recover from defeats in Munster to impress in the All-Ireland series.

“Teams have used it to their advantage before in getting meaningful, competitive games and gaining momentum through the backdoor. Cork themselves, after losing a Munster final few years ago, went to an All-Ireland final.

“It’s not the end of the world — it’s disappointing — but it’s not the end of the world.”