Paul Cahillane is a former professional footballer with the Celtic FC (Scotland) and Delap’s Army (Rep. of Ireland). He was a member of the infamous Celtic under 19 team which lost 5-0 to Glasgow rivals Rangers in the 2007 SFA Cup Final at Hampden Park. Since retiring from professional football due to a lack of ability he returned to his native Ireland and now plays GAA for Portlaoise,and Laois. He is a defender.
Cahillane was first noticed by scouts playing Ultimate Frisbee as a six year old in the under 15 Portlaoise Invitaional, a prestigous event that is part of the Leinster Ultimate Frisbee competition. Cahillane’s ability to control the frisbee on either foot led several top soccer clubs in Dublin to offer him a contract. According to his first coach at Belvedere Orchard Soccer Club Jimmy Nappy, “We felt that if he could control a frisbee, he could control a football.”
<ref>{{cite book|last=Paul Cahillane Story|first=The|title=The Paul Cahillane Story|year=2010|publisher=Portlaoise Press|location=Portlaoise}}</ref>
After he signed for Belvedere Orchard Cahillane’s career quickly took a turn for the better and he was forced to give up his promising basketball career. (It is likely that once he started using full size nets and not children’s nets, Cahillane’s basketball career would have ended regardless.)
International recognition came quickly and it was on his first trip away with the Irish under 13 soccer team to Thailand for an international Triangular tournament that Paul met and came under the guidance of ‘Lucy’, a Thai Ladyboy. The two have remained in contact to this very day, and Paul made the trip back to Thailand in June of 2010 to give ‘Lucy’ away at her wedding to Fritz Fritzenstein.
In October 2005 Cahillane was offered a contract by Glasgow Celtic FC in Scotland. He initially hesitated on signing on the deal as he hoped to be offered a contract by someone good, but he quickly realised that would not happen and he signed for Celtic on November 13th 2005 for an initial contract of £9.50 a week, the boxset of Dawson’s Creek, a can of Red Bull and treats for the boys.
Then Celtic manager Martin O’Neill was a huge admirer of the 4’4″ Irish international and immediately put him on growth hormones which increased Cahillane’s height to 4’7″ by the age of 18. At that stage though due to a combination of terrible tatoo’s, a poor attitude and bad haircuts, Cahillane was released by the Scottish giants having played a total of 83 minutes in his 3 years at the club, scoring two own goals.
During his time in Glasgow Cahillane became a fervent follower of the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster <ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.venganza.org/}}</ref> , a religion that he follows to this day.
Cahillane returned to his native Laois in 2008 and spent the next year travelling around Ireland in a van solving mysteries with his dog Scooby Doo. Eventually after solving all the unsolved mysteries in the thirty-two counties he decided to return to his first love of Ulimate Frisbee. Unfortunately by that stage the sport had evolved beyond all recognition and after several failed comeback attempts the diminutive ex-professional was forced to call it a day and turn to GAA.
After convincing the management at Portlaoise to give him a trial Cahillane managed to win a place on the team and he was part of the team which won their third Laois SFC in a row in 2009. He had absolutely no influence on the first two of those victories and had no reason to claim any part in the five-in-a-row celebrations which followed their subsequent triumphs in 2010 and 2011. He celebrated as if he had nonetheless.
In Septemeber 2009 Cahillane gained entry to NUI Maynooth. Nothing of note has occurred there and he has had limited/no success with ladies there.
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