Falkirk ace 'not sure' of messages from Hibs-minded family amid hat-trick vs Hibees as Hearts-mad dad thrilled
The Falkirk forward has gone from the seventh tier to grabbing a Scottish Premiership match ball - with Hearts and Hibs connections at home.
Falkirk striker Barney Stewart said his Hearts-loving dad was over the moon with his hat-trick in their 4-1 victory over Hibs - with his Easter Road-minded family less so.
Stewart scored three times in the Falkirk dismantling of the Hibees as he continues to impress for The Bairns, who are now only two points behind the Leith side in the table. The 21-year old revealed that a lot of his family grew up in Edinburgh, with supporters of both Hearts and Hibs in the Stewart clan.
It’s been a rollercoaster of a year for the forward, who was playing for the Heriot Watt University team in the seventh tier as recently as December 2024, where he is on the penultimate year of his sports science course. Stewart was understandably buzzing after his first top-flight hat-trick, although he also claimed he’s had mixed reviews from family members.
‘My dad’s a Jambo, so he’ll be over the moon’
He said: “When I was at Heriot Watt, maybe if the first year you told me that I was going to be doing this in a couple of years' time, I’d have said, ‘no way’. But I screwed my head on a little bit in the second and third year. And obviously, they do have a scholarship programme, so it does set me up a wee bit. But not the way that John McGlynn has changed me as a footballer here. Falkirk picking me up was a massive, massive step in my career.
"In the Premiership, it's just the pace of play, the speed of thought is so much quicker, which obviously it's adaptable, especially when you've got the players around you that obviously they've been playing in the Premiership this whole season. In the build-up to Saturday’s game, I was thinking ‘today's the day that I score’
“But I never would have thought three, that's too greedy to imagine. My missus' family was up from London to see the game, so I hope they come again, they've got to be a good luck charm. My dad’s a Jambo , so he'll be over the moon with that. He grew up in Edinburgh, so he's a big Hearts fan, but a couple of that side of the family are Hibs fans as well. Some uncles and stuff like that, so I'm sure I won't be getting a message off them this week.”
East of Scotland League ‘horrible’ for young forward
Stewart, who had time on loan in the Championship at Dunfermline Athletic this season, claimed that it was challenging playing against the rough and tumble defenders of the East of Scotland League while playing for Heriot Watt. He continued: “It was horrible. That's the only word for it! Those boys were stamping on my Achilles and sometimes there were no linesman to pick them up on it!
“This is night and day to be perfectly honest. I still keep up with a couple of the Heriot Watt results They're still doing alright in the league, but I wouldn't like to go back to that league! I’ve always backed my ability and that I can do it on the big stage. But the opportunity that Falkirk has given me is massive. And in my eyes, it's only up from here.
Despite his heroics in the Premiership, the forward is still multi-tasking as he prepares for his final year of uni. He said: “I’ve still got another year of uni. I failed one of my modules last year but I resat that at Christmas time and I think I've done alright in my resit. It just lets me for the rest of this year focus on football and then i've got my fourth year to do next year.”