Football clubs these days have got pretty good at what you might call the ‘teaser’ social media post. A picture, a clip, or sometimes just an emoji that trails a big announcement, usually in a way that’s just obscure enough to not explicitly say what the announcement is, but obvious enough that most fans can figure it out.Trabzonspor’s latest iteration, posted at about 11.30pm Turkish time on Tuesday evening, was towards the less subtle end of that scale.It was a 17-second, AI-generated clip of a pyramid, with green trees growing around it, that was revealed to be overlooking their Papara Park stadium, accompanied by a crown emoji.
𝐀𝐥𝐰𝐚𝐲𝐬 𝐛𝐞𝐥𝐢𝐞𝐯𝐢𝐧𝐠 👑 pic.twitter.com/3csin4wD5I
— Trabzonspor (@Trabzonspor) August 4, 2026Shortly afterwards came the announcement: after weeks of uncertainty about his future, and a few days of scarcely believable talk that Trabzonspor were in negotiations, the club confirmed that Mohamed Salah, the Premier League’s leading foreign goalscorer who left Liverpool at the end of last season, was on his way to sign.Their X account even confirmed what time Salah would be arriving at Istanbul’s Ataturk airport, the sort of thing that would be insane anywhere other than Turkey. This is, after all, a country in which there’s a saying that people think “titles are won at the airport”. Which is to say: by glamorous foreign signings.You could follow Salah’s progress live, on the Trabzonspor YouTube channel… as long as you signed up to their premium service, of course. The 34-year-old was mobbed as he arrived in Istanbul, shortly before travelling on to Trabzon, a more modestly sized city about 700 miles along Turkey’s northern coast.Around the time he landed, the club put out a video message of Salah wearing a Trabzonspor shirt on his plane. Although he will wear No 10 when he makes his debut, his shirt had No 61 on the back, a nod to the club and the city. Sixty-one is a number of huge significance to the people of Trabzon: it’s the postal code, car number plates begin with it and people have been known to pay extra to get a phone number with 61 in it. It has become a badge of identity for a city that has long existed in the shadow of the big metropolises, not just Istanbul but Ankara and Izmir too.He will sign a two-year deal, having turned down interest from a variety of clubs, including some in the United States and Saudi Arabia.As The Athletic reported in July, Sporting Kansas City — whose owner, Peter Mallouk, is the son of Egyptian immigrants — were the most prominent of the Major League Soccer teams interested in Salah. However, while Sporting KC were prepared to match his Liverpool wages — making him the second-highest paid player in MLS history behind Lionel Messi — they never made a formal offer after being told that Salah was willing to take less money to remain on the European stage.A clearly delighted Trabzonspor fan kisses a Salah banner (Ozan Kose/Getty Images)Another assumption was that Salah would go to Saudi Arabia after leaving Liverpool. It wasn’t entirely unfounded: Salah is the most high-profile Muslim player who isn’t already in the Saudi Pro League, clubs have tried to sign him a few times and he even admitted in 2025 that if he hadn’t signed a new contract at Liverpool, he would have gone there.“I still have a good relationship with them and I always stay in contact with them,” he told Egyptian TV station ON Sports. “Yes, we were talking to each other.”This time, he wasn’t particularly interested in anything Saudi Pro League clubs had to offer. When Liverpool faced Galatasaray in the Champions League last season, some of their players asked where he would be going after Liverpool and the message was: he didn’t know, but not Saudi Arabia.
