Pinilla wants to leave Hearts

By BARRY ANDERSON
MAURICIO PINILLA wants to leave Hearts to rebuild his career in Chile and develop a closer relationship with his two-year-old daughter, Agustina.
The striker's contract expires at the end of the season and, despite Hearts' option of retaining him on a new four-year deal, Pinilla is unlikely to play for the club again as he hankers after a fresh start in his homeland.

The mercurial South American intends on leaving Tynecastle this summer having made just eight appearances, scoring twice, in two injury-plagued years.

He has recovered from knee ligament damage sustained during training in January but remains unsettled at being so far from Agustina, who lives in Santiago with Pinilla's former partner, Gisella Gallardo.

"The wound is better and I feel well but now I feel that I need to return to Chile," he said. "It does me no good to be far from my daughter and I want to start from scratch."

The 24-year-old's £12,000-a-week contract is co-owned by the Italian club Inter Milan. He claims to have held discussions about returning to South America with Everton Vina del Mar, the club currently second top of the Chilean Primera Division.

"A time ago I had contacts with the people of Everton. Nothing has been activated, but I have several opportunities in my country," he said.

Pinilla spent the second half of last season loaned to Universidad de Chile but left in acrimonious circumstances following a bar-room incident. "In my last journey over there they blamed everything on me and it was not justified," he explained.

Meanwhile, post-split fixtures were announced by the SPL last nigh
t, confirming three home and two away matches for Hearts through to the end of the season. St Mirren, Inverness and Kilmarnock will all visit Tynecastle, while Stephen Frail's side must travel to Falkirk for a Monday night fixture on May 5 before ending the campaign away to relegated Gretna.

"The fixtures have been reasonably kind to us so from that aspect it's fairly pleasing," said Frail. "We've avoided a trip up to Inverness and we only have two away games from five so it's up to the players to ensure we rack up as many points as we can."

Bruno Aguiar, Hearts' Portuguese midfielder, returned to full training yesterday for the first time since undergoing ankle surgery and Frail is hopeful of seeing him play some reserve football before the end of the season.

"He's back training which is encouraging and we'll see how he progresses from here," said the interim manager.

Taken from the Scotsman