When Mohamed Salah drives home to Yomra, he will soon pass a sign carrying his own name.

The municipal council in the district on the eastern edge of Trabzon has unanimously approved renaming Selvi Street, in the Kaşüstü neighbourhood where the Egyptian lives, to “Mohamed Salah Street.” The Turkish Ministry of Foreign Affairs signed off on the plan inside a week, and the street opening is expected within the next 20 days.

No foreign footballer has ever had a street named after him in Trabzon before.

The mayor who pushed it through

The proposal came from Yomra mayor Mustafa Bıyık, who tabled it with the council and shepherded it through both the local vote and the ministerial sign-off.

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“We are deeply proud that Mohamed Salah, the biggest transfer in the history of Turkish football, has chosen to live in our district,” Bıyık said in comments reported by Africa Soccer.

The mayor added that Salah himself had welcomed the news and expressed his happiness at being tied so permanently to the area. The municipality plans to invite the forward to the opening ceremony.

Salah-mania on the Black Sea

The street naming is only the loudest sign of what has built up around Salah since the summer. The 34-year-old left Liverpool after nine seasons and signed a two-year contract through June 2028, with thousands of supporters packing out Trabzon Airport on the day he landed on 5 August.

Trabzonspor shirt sales had reached 116,000 by late September, a 152% jump on the same stretch of last year, and season-ticket sales passed 25,000. The club picked up a million new social media followers in the weeks after the signing, and new Cairo-Trabzon flights launched the month he arrived.

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On the pitch, Salah has not slowed the hype. He scored a hat-trick and set up a fourth in a 4-0 win over Galatasaray on 19 September, then added a goal and an assist in a 4-2 UEFA Conference League win over KuPS on 15 October. He has been among the top scorers in the Turkish Süper Lig this season.

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