Kyogo Furuhashi's Struggles at Birmingham City: A Costly Gamble

When Birmingham City prised Kyogo Furuhashi away from Celtic in the summer of 2025, it felt like a statement. Eighty-five goals in 165 games for the Scottish champions. Champions League minutes in his legs. Movement that shredded defences north of the border.

For a newly promoted Championship side, it looked like a minor coup. A ready-made No 9, dropped straight into St Andrew’s, expected to dovetail with Jay Stansfield and drag Birmingham into mid-table comfort at worst, something more ambitious at best.

It never got close.

The season barely started before it began to unravel for the 31-year-old. He stumbled through those early weeks, the sharpness that defined his time at Celtic replaced by hesitation and snatched finishes. One league goal. That was it. A shoulder problem that had lingered in the background finally forced him under the knife and drew a line under a campaign that never really got going.

Former Blues midfielder Curtis Morrison, watching from a distance but with clear disbelief, struggled to square the player he saw at Celtic with the one labouring in Birmingham colours.

“I can't believe why it's not working because at Celtic his movement and the chances and the goals he was scoring were fantastic,” he told GOAL, speaking in association with Freebets.com.

The chances were there. That, in many ways, is what makes the story more brutal. This was not a forward starved of service or marooned in a dysfunctional system. The ball arrived. The runs were made. The net, almost unfailingly in Glasgow, stayed stubbornly untouched in the Midlands.

“He was getting the chances at Birmingham City but just wasn't putting them in, and that can happen,” Morrison said. “That's just a player short on confidence and it hasn't really worked out. His work rate's fantastic but you've got to have a bit more than work rate when you're a number nine. You need to score goals and he was getting opportunities and he was just rushing at them.”

The pressure told, and it told early. In the Championship, strikers live and die on their first few weeks. Score quickly, and the rhythm comes. Miss, and the doubts creep in, the crowd tenses, every touch feels heavier.

Morrison is convinced those opening games set the tone.

“I think if he had started there in his first few games and started scoring a lot of goals as a centre-forward, his confidence would have just gone back through the roof and he would have scored a lot of goals, but he hasn't been anywhere near it.”

That gap between expectation and reality now leaves Birmingham with a decision that cuts to the heart of their recruitment strategy. Persist or cut loose?

“That's a player they could move on because he's on big money and they try to see if they can get some money for him,” Morrison admitted. “Or do they stick with him and say, ‘this season could be your season and we don't have to spend money because he should be scoring goals in the Championship’.”

He has, after all, proved he can do it elsewhere. The Scottish Premiership may not carry the same depth as the Championship, but 85 goals is not an accident. It speaks to instincts, timing, and a penalty-box craft that does not simply vanish.

“He scored goals in the Scottish Premiership, so it's a difficult one,” Morrison added. “I hope he stays and I hope next season is his season, but you never know at Birmingham City because they have money - they can bring in players and move players on.”

Morrison is not alone in his surprise. EFL pundit Don Goodman, who watched Kyogo closely through those fraught early weeks, saw the confidence seep away in real time.

“He started missing real gilt-edge chances in those first six, eight games and you could slowly but surely just see the confidence drain away from him,” Goodman previously told GOAL.

The numbers around the transfer now hang heavy. Transfer fees and wages always form part of the conversation, but when a marquee signing returns a single league goal, the scrutiny intensifies.

“In terms of value for money, it's gone horribly wrong with regard to that particular transfer,” Goodman said. “And it's surprising, really. I like his movement. He's energetic, he's quick. But he didn't look like he could hit a barn door, if I'm honest with you, after a difficult start.”

That is the brutal reality of life as a centre-forward. The running, the pressing, the selfless work off the ball – all appreciated, all secondary. In the end, the ledger comes down to goals. Kyogo’s Birmingham chapter so far is defined by the ones that never came.

Now the club stand at a crossroads. Do they bet that a fully fit, reset Kyogo can rediscover the instinct that terrorised Scottish defences, or accept that this bold move has backfired and move him on while they still can?

For a player once hailed as a coup, the next decision will say everything about where Birmingham believe his story goes from here.