ChatGPTFootball, the name of the game loved by millions, or perhaps you could say billions, around the world, but for many players it is nothing more than a means to achieve bigger goals, some of them related to the game itself and some far beyond that.
Egyptian star Mohamed Salah appears to be the second type. He now embarks on a new and perhaps final chapter of his career, moving to the Turkish league with Trabzonspor in a deal that has sparked plenty of controversy.
Trabzonspor's capture of Mohamed Salah has drawn fierce criticism from many of the Egyptian's admirers. Their argument is simple: the Turkish league sits below his abilities, his name and his history.
Only once before has Salah faced such strong opposition to a transfer. That was 12 years ago, and strangely for the opposite reasons, when he left Switzerland's Basel for Chelsea in January 2014.
Back then, the Egyptian stood on the verge of joining Liverpool. Chelsea and their Portuguese manager at the time, José Mourinho, stepped in at the last moment and snatched the deal away.
Many of his fans hated the move. Chelsea were packed with stars, and that made life difficult for a young man still at the start of his football career.
Liverpool, by contrast, needed "Mo" far more. They were locked in a fierce title race with Chelsea and Manchester City that season and wanted an attacking player to line up alongside Luis Suárez and Daniel Sturridge.
Salah followed his heart in the end and answered Mourinho, who had phoned him personally to seal it. He surely came to regret the decision, because he never got a real chance at Chelsea.
Three and a half years passed before he put the mistake right. Liverpool signed him in the summer of 2017 after spells at Fiorentina and Roma, but he arrived at 25 rather than 21, and that cut short the length of his career with the Reds.
Now, Salah has gone against the wishes of his fans for the second time, choosing to move to Trabzonspor. He probably won't regret it. The likelihood is that he's chasing aims far removed from those his admirers criticise him for, and far removed too from football.
Those aims began to surface almost a full year ago. A few days after renewing his contract with Liverpool until 2027, the Egyptian star bought a luxury villa in the Turkish city of Bodrum for 10 million dollars, the equivalent of half a billion Egyptian pounds.
He took that step not only after renewing with Liverpool, but also after spending his summer holiday that year in the very same Turkish coastal city.
Clearly, the Egyptian star was thinking of living for some time, and perhaps for a long time, in Turkey. Maybe once his football career was over. But why not during it?
Since the summer window opened, and with "Mo's" Liverpool chapter closed, one thing looked clear: his agent, Ramy Abbas, was hunting for the right offer in the Turkish league, even as bids arrived from Saudi Arabia and America.
That told its own story. Salah hadn't weighed up Trabzonspor, or Beşiktaş before them, for footballing reasons. He wanted to enjoy his personal life in a city that had won him over, and the motive may have run deeper still, into commercial investment.
Turkish newspaper "Sabah" confirmed at the time that Turkish businessman Ahmet Karakol, Mohamed Salah's commercial partner in England, lay behind his trip to Bodrum last summer.
Owner of numerous tourism companies and investments across Turkey, Karakol was eager to host the Egyptian star on that visit.
This commercial relationship, and the luxury villa in Bodrum that it produced, may well have shaped Salah's thinking and turned the Turkish league into his destination for fresh business ventures.
The move brought Salah handsome rewards too. He will earn an annual salary of 17 million euros, plus another 5 million in incentives and variables, along with 20% of the revenue from sales of products bearing his name.
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Mohamed Salah is hardly the first player to put non-sporting priorities front and centre. Plenty of the game's biggest names have done the same, none more so than Portugal's Cristiano Ronaldo and Argentina's Lionel Messi.
Back in the winter of 2023, Ronaldo delivered one of the biggest shocks in football history. He chose to join the Saudi league, and Al-Nassr specifically, after a long career with Europe's giants in Manchester United, Real Madrid and Juventus.
Belief in the Saudi project alone did not drive the move. The lavish perks did too, chief among them a staggering salary reported at 200 million euros a year.
"The Don" secured even more after renewing his contract in 2025. He picked up 15% of Al-Nassr's shares, along with a private jet and a full team of 16 people to serve him.
Messi followed a similar path when he joined Inter Miami in the summer of 2023. He wanted to settle in a global tourist city, and he agreed to a salary ranging from 50 to 80 million dollars a year.
The Argentine star also signed up for a slice of the American club's ownership upon retirement, a cut of shirt sales, and a share of the revenue from new subscriptions to the streaming service that broadcasts the American league's matches.
This perhaps reveals part of why Mohamed Salah refused to move to the Saudi Pro League, despite a huge offer to join Al-Ittihad worth 25 million euros per year, an increase of 8 million over his salary with Trabzonspor.
Jeddah may sit on the coast, but Saudi Arabia endures high temperatures for most of the year, something many of the world's football stars who recently joined the Saudi Pro League have complained about.
Even 25 million euros in the first season guarantees nothing for the second, not with the significant public pressure that weighs on players in Saudi Arabia.
Laurent Blanc proved as much. The French coach left Al-Ittihad after just four rounds of last season, despite having won the league and cup titles the previous campaign.
Several stars have been linked with an exit from the Saudi Pro League on more than one occasion, worn down by the constant criticism. Even Ronaldo himself has felt it, as has the French striker Karim Benzema.
Salah would carry an even greater burden as the number one star, and Al-Ittihad are not enjoying their best period. They are struggling badly at both the technical and administrative levels, which makes the question of his success and brilliance there a genuine risk.
The criticism started before he could even sign. Ben Harburg, the American owner of Al-Kholood, argued that the Saudi Pro League is no place to spend a retirement holiday.
Saudi media figure Waleed Al-Farraj also urged Salah not to join the Roshn League, insisting it was the wrong destination for him at this moment, while fellow media figure Saud Al-Sarami branded him finished.
Turkey told a different story. Salah landed to a historic welcome, thousands greeting him at the airport and chanting his name, with the authorities keen to complete the deal even when his move to Besiktas stalled.
Trabzonspor's ambitions are nothing like Al-Ittihad's, either. The Turkish club are not hunting titles so much as European qualification, given the dominance of Galatasaray and Fenerbahce at the top.
All of this would hand the Egyptian more calm and security to see out his contract with the Turkish club, unlike the Saudi Pro League, which he could have left after just a single season had he failed to deliver.
Salah, though, may be walking into a scenario he never imagined: becoming the Turkish league's answer to Ronaldo, mirroring what the Portuguese did when he joined Al-Nassr in the winter of 2023.
No other star has ever received the kind of historic welcome that greeted the Egyptian, and the Turkish league has hardly been short of world-class names over the past few years.
This could be the springboard for more marquee signings, with the Turkish league setting out to challenge Europe's biggest competitions.
If it does, the achievement will shine on Salah's CV long after he retires. History will remember him as the godfather of the Turkish league's new era.
