The Korean marque's workmanlike products would mop up a respectable number of sales on a value for money ticket but challenge for a place at the European car market's top table?

Pull the other one. Eyes were taken off the ball, laurels were casually reclined upon and now Hyundai is the sixth largest car manufacturer in the world. What's more, it has set its sights firmly on the lucrative European big time.

The i30 gave us initial confirmation that this was no joke and the i10 aims to underline Hyundai's ambition.

The engine choice isn't a choice at all. Every one of Hyundai's i10 customers gets a 1.1-litre petrol engine under their bonnet with 66bhp on tap.

It's a four-cylinder unit that produces its peak power at 5,500rpm and develops maximum torque of 99Nm at 2,800rpm. These figures make similar reading to those of the 1.0-litre three-cylinder powerplant that's used by the i10's Toyota Aygo, Citroen C1 and Peugeot 107 rivals but where that engine has fractionally more power, the i10's has fractionally more torque. Compared to the 1.1-litre four-cylinder engine in Fiat's Panda, the i10's unit looks stronger by quite a margin. The little Fiat can only manage 54bhp and 88Nm of torque.

The i10's long wheelbase has been achieved by pushing the wheels right into the corners of the car so as not to increase overall length by too much. At 3,565mm long and 1,595mm wide, the i10 remains usefully compact.

It's actually 166mm shorter than the Toyota Aygo and around 25mm longer than a Fiat Panda so parking shouldn't be too problematic. The exterior design is appealing in an unadventurous kind of way.

The city car market was once riddled with non-descript wheeled boxes whereas modern offerings tend to lay on the cheeky style as thick as possible and the i10 falls somewhere between these two stools. The gentle curves around the front end work well and the rear is a little sharper with its angles but the overall shape is neatly integrated.

The interior is the area of the i30 hatchback that most impressed observers. Not because it achieved anything particularly new or groundbreaking but because it managed to ape its leading European rivals so effectively.

The i10's cabin looks to do the same and again, the design is simple but appealing. The vibrancy and ingenuity that characterises the best small car interiors doesn't appear to be in evidence but Hyundai looks to have concentrated on getting the fundamentals right. The safety-first approach should help maintain the brand's steady forward momentum.

The wisdom of offering diesel engines in city cars is always open to question. They bump the price up by quite a margin and this extra outlay isn't easily recouped through an oil-burner's superior fuel economy because of the short distances that city cars typically travel.

To buy a diesel city car, you've got to really like the extra torque and way it drives. Fortunately, the i10 doesn't even give us the option and the 1.1-litre petrol engine should be well up to taking care of business single-handed. It is capable of average fuel economy in the region of 60mpg with emissions that dip under the 120g/km barrier at 119g/km.

Hyundai's designers have worked to maximise the interior space on the i10 city car while retaining the micro exterior dimensions that are all important in the urban jungle.

It also looks like displaying the step up in build quality that won so much acclaim for the i30 family hatch.

Things are looking up for Hyundai but the work of breaking into the mainstream can't be done by a couple of new models.

It's a long term effort and while buyers get used to the idea, the i10's hefty equipment quota and five-year warranty won't go amiss.