Former Birmingham City striker Tommy Mooney believes record signing Cristian Benitez could be a throw-back to Christophe Dugarry.

"That (the Benitez deal) goes to show just how far the club have come, he's not somebody I know about but if the board are prepared to give that money then they must have a lot of confidence in the player," Mooney, who played for Blues between June 2001 and July 2003, told the Birmingham Mail.

"It's a throwback to when the club signed Christophe Dugarry when I was at the club. They never paid a transfer fee for him but he was earning a lot more than the rest of the dressing room but if they are top players then you accept that.

"Dugarry was certainly the best player I played with, he knew what he was going to do with his fifth touch before he'd made his first and he was a nice guy to boot, He single-handedly kept us in the Premier League that season.

"For a club like Birmingham going up into the Premier League they know that they are going to concede goals so they have to find somebody who can score goals and to do it (the Benitez deal) so early in the summer is a bold move."