Exclusive: Former Hearts striker Aidan Keena set to leave Hartlepool United due to 'personal reasons' with Falkirk transfer lined up

The 21-year-old striker scored twice in eight appearances for Pools after joining from Hearts in January.

And after completing his final training session on Friday, he’s now set to return north of the border to sign for Scottish League One side Falkirk – with the birth of his first child expected in October.

Keena was one of the eight players contracted at Hartlepool and remained very much in Challinor’s plans going into the 2020-21 campaign.

Now the United boss will have to explore options elsewhere after allowing the young forward to leave on a free transfer.

“Sometimes life changes, Aidan came here in January and all things being equal, he was still in our plans and would have been with us,” Challinor said.

“His girlfriend is pregnant and due to give birth in October and she’s obviously young, as Aidan is, and from Scotland.

"He’d been back up in Glasgow during the lockdown and it was always going to be a tough one so I spoke to Aidan pretty much straight away over the summer.

"It just fits better for him to be back up there for his first child and a girlfriend who was obviously a long way from home and no family support – it was always going to be difficult.

"I’ve been there myself and lots of the players have so it's a time in his life and his career where he needs to be happy and things need to work for him so all things being sorted, he’ll go back up there with our best wishes.

"He could go up there and absolutely burn it up and it’s not like he’s left on bad terms by any means.

"We’ve just made a decision to look after his best interests at this point and hopefully he goes up there and everything is good and works out with his child and he scores a lot of goals for Falkirk and we see where we go.

"Sometimes football has to take a back seat to family logistics and how it’s going to work.”

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