Salah flies to Istanbul in a Trabzonspor shirt, days after the club said there was no deal

At the weekend the president of Trabzonspor said there was no agreement with Mohamed Salah, no plan to sign him and no flight booked. On Wednesday Salah boarded a plane to Istanbul wearing a Trabzonspor shirt.

The club has now put it in writing, filing a disclosure with Turkey’s Public Disclosure Platform to say that negotiations had opened to sign the Egyptian, who is a free agent. That filing is the closest thing to an official confirmation in Turkish football, because listed clubs have to tell the exchange before they tell the fans.

The day, as planned

Salah was due into the general aviation terminal at Istanbul’s Ataturk Airport around midday, with a medical in the city before he flies on to Trabzon. Ertugrul Dogan, who was denying all of this to A Spor a few days ago, is now talking about it openly. “We needed a player of his quality and I believe this will be a great signing for us,” he said. Salah’s own contribution, posted as he travelled, was to ask whether Trabzon was ready.

A signing ceremony is planned for Thursday at Papara Park, where the club expects a crowd in the thousands. He is set to take the number 11. Nothing is signed yet, and the paperwork is due to be completed after the medical, so the last chance for this to fall over the way the Besiktas move did has not quite passed.

Around 17 million a year, and a cut of the shirts

The reported deal runs two years, to June 2028, at something close to 17.5 million euros a season, with performance bonuses on top and a share of the club’s licensed merchandise income, reported at around a fifth. That last piece is the interesting one. Trabzonspor are betting that his name sells enough shirts to cover a chunk of his own wages, which is how a club that finished third affords a salary at this level at all.

Turkish outlets are calling it the richest contract in the country’s football history. Be careful with that. Victor Osimhen’s reported salary at Galatasaray for this season is 18.75 million euros gross, and gross and net are not the same currency in Turkish football. Nobody has published the two numbers on the same basis, so the record claim is doing a lot of work.

Besiktas got there first and could not finish it

Besiktas had the deal in their hands in July. They offered a guaranteed 15 million euros a year with bonuses that could have taken the package past 19 million, then stopped, saying publicly that they would not break their own salary structure or hand out privileges other employees do not get. Image rights were the other sticking point. Saudi interest has never entirely gone away either, with Al Ittihad reported to have come back at around 25 million dollars a year.

Salah has been free since 1 July, when he and Liverpool agreed to tear up the final year of a contract that ran to 2027. Nine years, 257 goals in 442 appearances, two Premier League titles and a Champions League. He turned 34 in June.

What Trabzonspor are actually buying

Third place last season, 69 points, and a tenth Turkish Cup after beating Konyaspor in the final. It got them a Europa League play-off round rather than a group-stage place, and that gap is roughly the size of the problem Salah is being hired to solve. Galatasaray and Fenerbahce spend on a different scale. Trabzonspor have not won the league since 2022.

Signing a 34-year-old on a two-year deal at that money is not a football decision on its own, and the club is not pretending otherwise. It is a statement about where Trabzonspor think they belong, aimed at their own support as much as at the table. Whether Salah still has the legs for a Turkish season, in a league that kicks a good deal harder than the Premier League, is the part nobody can settle until autumn.

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