Mohamed Salah is officially a Trabzonspor player.
According to the Daily Mail, the decision came down to one non-negotiable condition, and come unexpected voices inside the Trabzonspor dressing room helped get the deal over the line.
A significant pay cut was never something he was willing to consider, a factor that would have ruled out Champions League clubs elsewhere in Spain and Italy.
Manchester United goalkeeper Andre Onana, back at Trabzonspor on loan for a second straight season, reached out to Salah directly for private talks to make the case for the club.
According to the Daily Mail, Onana’s pitch carried real weight in Salah’s eventual decision.
Mohamed Salah is officially a Trabzonspor player. The Turkish club confirmed the signing this week after the Egyptian passed a medical and signed a two-year contract, closing one of the summer’s longest-running transfer sagas.
The move brings down the curtain on a legendary nine-year stay at Liverpool, where Salah scored 257 goals and added 113 assists in 442 appearances, winning two Premier Leagues and a Champions League.
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Liverpool and Salah had already agreed to part ways before the end of last season, with the 34-year-old expected to continue his career outside England.
For weeks, Salah’s next destination looked set to be somewhere else entirely.
His name had been linked with Besiktas in Turkey, Saudi club Al-Ittihad and interest from Major League Soccer. In the end, none of those options materialised.
According to the Daily Mail, the decision came down to one non-negotiable condition, and come unexpected voices inside the Trabzonspor dressing room helped get the deal over the line.
Staying in European competition mattered more to Salah than any of the financial offers on the table.
A significant pay cut was never something he was willing to consider, a factor that would have ruled out Champions League clubs elsewhere in Spain and Italy.
Trabzonspor found a different way to appeal to him: a role leading the club’s Europa League campaign, and a wage package that made him the highest-paid player in Turkish football, ahead of Galatasaray’s Victor Osimhen.
Getting Salah to seriously weigh that offer took more than numbers on a page.
Manchester United goalkeeper Andre Onana, back at Trabzonspor on loan for a second straight season, reached out to Salah directly for private talks to make the case for the club.
According to the Daily Mail, Onana’s pitch carried real weight in Salah’s eventual decision.
Egyptian international Mahmoud Trezeguet, also on Trabzonspor’s books, ran his own parallel effort to sell the move, part of what the Daily Mail described as a coordinated recruitment push from within the squad.
“It is understood that Manchester United goalkeeper Andre Onana, on loan at Trabzonspor for the second successive season, contacted Salah for secret talks to put forward a sales pitch for the Black Sea club.”
“The Cameroonian is believed to have made a compelling pitch which sources familiar with the talks feel was significant in helping convince Salah. Egyptian team-mate Mahmoud Trezeguet also put together his own Trabzonspor pitch as part of a cleverly co-ordinated recruitment drive.”
Mohamed Salah will now line up alongside both players as Trabzonspor push to close the gap on Galatasaray and Fenerbahce, while also carrying the club’s hopes into the Europa League this season.
