In a transfer move that sent shockwaves across the global football community, Egyptian superstar Mohamed Salah has put pen to paper on a two-year contract with Turkish side Trabzonspor, capping off an unlikely pursuit that defied widespread expectations. The historic signing was celebrated in front of a roaring crowd of 35,000 passionate fans at Trabzonspor’s Papara Park stadium, where even club president Ertugrul Dogan — the architect of the deal — could barely contain his excitement over pulling off one of the most surprising high-profile transfers in recent football history.
Dogan, a native Trabzon local who built his business empire across real estate, hazelnut trading, and the biofuel energy sector before taking over as club president in 2023, has openly described the capture of Salah as a transformative moment for his boyhood club. The deal has already sent ripples of excitement across global football, with many observers left wondering how a mid-sized Turkish club, without Champions League football and just one domestic league title since its 1970s and early 1980s heyday, convinced one of the game’s biggest names to spurn more high-profile suitors from Saudi Arabia and the United States.
Trabzonspor is based in the coastal Black Sea city of Trabzon, a city of 800,000 located in Turkey’s far northeast near the Georgian border that does not even rank among Turkey’s 20 largest urban centers. But Dogan argues the city and its club hold a unique, intangible appeal that sets it apart from other destinations. “We’re the biggest one-club city in the world,” Dogan told BBC Sport Africa and BBC Turkish in an exclusive interview. When Salah asked why he should choose Trabzonspor, Dogan’s answer was simple: “You can be sure you will meet a group of supporters unlike any you have experienced before. You’ll feel the genuine love those people have inside them.”
For Dogan, the signing of Salah is the centerpiece of a broader club strategy that balances investment in emerging young talent with high-profile experienced stars. In the most recent off-season, Trabzonspar turned a significant profit by selling 20-year-old Ivorian midfielder Christ Inao Oulai to Fiorentina and 22-year-old Brazilian forward Felipe Augusto to Zenit St Petersburg after just one season at the club. Those outgoing transfers were replaced by promising young prospects from across Europe and Africa, while Cameroon goalkeeper Andre Onana returned for a second season on loan from Manchester United. But the Salah deal stands alone as a potential game-changer for the club’s global profile.
Dogan has been transparent about the financial terms of the deal, confirming Salah will earn €17m per year, plus 20% of all revenue from merchandise bearing his name. While the transfer does not promise an immediate direct financial return, Dogan says the intangible value of global attention and fan engagement is immeasurable. Even after raising season ticket prices to help fund the deal, fan enthusiasm has outstripped all expectations: nearly 70% of Salah’s annual salary was already covered by season ticket sales within just five days of the announcement. The club initially targeted 25,000 season ticket sales, but now projects to pass 30,000, with major corporate sponsors from Turkey, Europe, and the Arab world reaching out to get involved with what fans have dubbed “Salah-mania.”
Salah, who scored 191 Premier League goals and sits fourth on the league’s all-time top scorers list after nine seasons with Liverpool, was widely expected to move to either the Saudi Pro League, where many elite global stars have landed in recent years, or join Lionel Messi in Major League Soccer in the United States. But Dogan says the deal came together surprisingly quickly once negotiations entered their final stage. Trabzonspor had initially been tracking Salah since the 2022 World Cup, while the player was in talks with multiple suitors, and respected an unwritten Turkish club convention that holds no club will disrupt another’s ongoing negotiations. Once other interested Turkish clubs pulled out of the running, talks progressed rapidly, with the full deal concluded in just five to six days.
Initial discussions took place over Zoom while Salah was on holiday in Mykonos, Greece, before the player traveled to Istanbul for his medical. Dogan intentionally chose Istanbul for the medical to show Salah the scale of fan support across the entire country, not just in Trabzon — and the gamble paid off: thousands of fans turned out at the airport to greet the superstar mid-week on a working day. Salah made his debut as a second-half substitute in a 1-1 away draw against Kasimpasa on the opening weekend of the new Turkish Super Lig season, and is set to make his much-anticipated home debut in Trabzon this coming Sunday.
Trabzonspor, nicknamed the Black Sea Storm, has enjoyed mixed success in recent seasons: it claimed the 2021-22 Super Lig title shortly before Dogan took over as president, and has finished third, seventh, and third in the league under his leadership, while claiming the Turkish Cup last season. The club is currently competing in the Europa League play-offs, holding a narrow 1-0 first-leg deficit against Hungary’s Ferencvaros heading into the second leg. Beyond the immediate buzz of the transfer, Dogan says he hopes the signing of Salah will put Trabzon on the map as a global destination for top young talent, helping develop prospects to move on to bigger European clubs while creating a blueprint for sustainable future success. For Dogan and Trabzonspor’s millions of passionate fans, the signing of Salah has already delivered a moment of joy that will last for years to come.