Trolls impact stars
Cloke worried for wellbeing in AFL
TRAVIS Cloke fears an AFL player could self-harm over relentless social media trolling.
The Collingwood premiership player has revealed that many players check their phones minutes after games to feed their social media addictions.
Cloke told News Corp’s Sacked podcast that social media giants such as Twitter and Instagram needed to take greater responsibility for unidentified trolls.
He said anonymous sledges played a part in his battle with anxiety and mental health issues.
Cloke said players ignored directions by their clubs to stay off mobile phones in the changerooms and would check social media accounts within 10 minutes of the siren.
“It definitely impacted me,” Cloke said.
“I used to finish a game of footy, and you would pick up the phone and read Twitter and take up the comments a 10-year-old kid had to say instead of the person standing in front of us, being your coach.
“Players literally pick up their phones, see how many SuperCoach points they have got, check their ranking scores, how they went, because that’s how they justify their performance.
“So in my eyes, that was what was happening – I was trying to get justification for my game from social media, literally 10-year-old kids sitting behind a computer screen.
“Sometimes you laughed because it was amazing for them to come up with that.
“But some were disgusting – you can question me as a footballer, but don’t question me as a person.”
Cloke said the situation was “going to get worse before it gets better”.
“I truly do believe we will push the line with social media and someone will actually selfharm before we do get some really good results out of this,” he said.
Bulldogs president Peter Gordon, a renowned legal expert, last year said the AFL should not consider broadcast deals with companies such as Facebook until they took responsibility for what they published.
Cloke said social media could be as addictive as smoking.
“You walk into the room, sing the song if you have won, sit on the ground for a couple of minutes if you have lost, and then walk to the locker and grab your phone,” he said.
“It could be a matter of 10 minutes after you have played a game of footy.
“You haven’t even had the coach’s address, haven’t spoken to an assistant coach, haven’t spoken to your wife, girlfriend or family.
“You grab your phone and that was not just me, it was 21 other players in the dressing rooms doing the exact same thing.
“At the end of my career you weren’t allowed your phones – but the boys still had their phones, don’t worry about that.”