Exclusive: Sky Sports pundit reacts to Birmingham City star's "outstanding" display against Ipswich Town | OneFootball

Sky Sports pundit Don Goodman has told FLW how exciting the signing of Kyogo Furuhashi at Birmingham City is.

Having gained promotion back to the Championship at the first time of asking last season, Birmingham City have set their sights on back-to-back promotions and a return to the Premier League.

The Blues won the League One title with an all-time record points tally for the EFL, of 111, with Chris Davies’ second-city outfit ruthless and dominant throughout after a summer of heavy spending.

That heavy spending has continued into this summer with the arrival of Japan international Kyogo Furuhashi from Ligue 1 outfit Stade Rennais for a fee believed to be in the region of £10 million.

The former Celtic striker put in an excellent and tireless performance on his competitive debut for City on the opening day of the season, as they shared a 1-1 draw with Ipswich Town at St Andrew’s.

After just seven minutes, Kyogo dinked the ball over the head of Ipswich's Alex Palmer, only to see what would have been a remarkable debut goal in Blues colours ruled out for a contentious foul on Jacob Greaves. A similar lobbed effort in the second half also hit the woodwork, before Jay Stansfield converted the rebound to fire Blues ahead.

His performance and signing is giving Birmingham fans a lot to be excited for and optimistic about this season, as they aim to return to the top-flight for the first time in over a decade and a half.

Don Goodman praises Birmingham City's "outstanding" Kyogo Furuhashi for Ipswich Town display

There had been slight concerns over the level of quality of Furuhashi, and whether or not his style of play could translate to playing in the Championship.

The Japanese frontman arrived off the back of a brief and disappointing time over in France, although he was prolific over a number of years for Celtic and the early indication is that Birmingham are going to see that side of him.

It is only one game into this season and his career Birmingham as a whole, but the signs are extremely exciting for Birmingham fans, as Sky Sports pundit Don Goodman has exclusively addressed with Football League World.

Goodman said: “I must admit with regards to Kyogo, I did think it was a lot of money, but having seen him first-hand on Friday night, I really, really thought he was outstanding.

“He is going to be really exciting, and you could hear and feel the appreciation of the Birmingham City fans of the work rate. The work rate, he just never stopped running.

“He does that thing that defenders hate in that he just runs in behind them and stretches the play, so I think that both him and Birmingham City are in line for a really, really good season this year.”

Birmingham City have been busy again this summer

The signing of Furuhashi is perhaps the marquee addition to a squad that was already seemingly very strong for Championship level, and of a summer that has seen plenty of other big names either arrive or return to the club.

Birmingham academy graduate Demarai Gray left the club in January 2016, but he has returned nearly a decade on to try and lift City into the top-flight once again.

As well as the signing of Gray, Birmingham have completed the loan acquisitions of James Beadle, Eiran Cashin and Tommy Doyle, with Bright Osayi-Samuel signing from Fenerbahce and Kanya Fujimoto from Gil Vicente.

Phil Neumann signed a pre-contract agreement back in January, whilst experienced attacker Marvin Ducksch has also bolstered the Birmingham front-line after joining from Werder Bremen.

Birmingham are expected to be active in the final few weeks of this summer’s transfer window, but they seemingly have some way to go to match the potential impact of Furuhashi this summer.