Salah’s move is the latest sign of Turkish football’s growing appeal to established stars.

Victor Osimhen, Leroy Sane, Ilkay Gundogan, Nathan Ake and Leandro Trossard are among the high-profile names now playing in the Super Lig, while Andre Onana, Ruslan Malinovskyi and Stefan Savic are already part of Trabzonspor’s squad.

Last summer, the Super Lig recorded the third-highest net transfer spend in world football behind only the Premier League and Saudi Pro League, highlighting the league’s increasing ambition.

The economics behind that spending are unusual.

Turkey’s biggest clubs generate substantial income in euros through Uefa competition while many domestic operating costs remain in Turkish lira.

The country’s prolonged period of high inflation has also reduced the relative value of existing domestic debt, giving clubs greater flexibility than might initially appear.

Financially, Trabzonspor were therefore able to present Salah with an attractive package.

Reports in Turkey say he has signed a two-year contract until June 2028 worth around £7.3m per season, below the salary he could reportedly have earned in Saudi Arabia, with additional bonuses and a share of merchandise revenue linked to his name.

The result is a league capable of offering competitive salaries, passionate fanbases and European football to players entering the latter stages of their careers.

Jack believes the competition’s profile is continuing to rise.

“The league is getting stronger every year and you’re seeing more and more big names joining,” he said.

“Salah is probably the biggest name to move to Turkey in recent years. It shows the league is growing and it might persuade other top players to consider going there. There are great stadiums, great cities and it’s a competitive league.”

His own experience reinforced that impression.

“I loved it,” Jack added. “Everyone helps you settle in and the people are really friendly. When foreign players arrive, the clubs do everything they can to help them.”

Alcaraz won his last match, beating a qualifier in the opening round of the Barcelona Open, but was in visible discomfort and withdrew before the following round.

Photographs and videos were posted to his social media channels showing him participating in a training session in Murcia on Tuesday, sporting the longer hair he has grown out during his absence.

A competitive return is still a few weeks off at least, however, meaning he will at best be carrying almost five months’ worth of rust into the US Open, or at worst won’t be able to play at all.

But with wrist injuries in tennis, waiting longer can help prevent the problem becoming recurrent.

“The biggest risk of injury is a previous injury – if you have had it once, you are more likely to have it in the future”, Ross adds.

“If a player can get back over a period of a few months and they don’t have a reoccurrence, generally they will be ok.

“But some things can become chronic and the pressure of the sport to come back, earn money by playing, and keep your ranking points, is a risk.”

One of the key challenges a wrist injury presents is psychological – once a player has suffered a painful injury in the joint which controls so much of their technique, it can be difficult to fully trust it again.

“Wrists aren’t easy”, said Andy Murray towards the end of his career, having suffered injuries in both wrists in his early 20s.

“When the ball is low you know you really have to use your wrist to get the ball up and down, or when the ball is coming fast and quite high you need to use your wrist a lot to bring the ball down.

“It’s difficult when you try to come back [from a wrist injury], because the pain that you feel when you initially hurt it, mentally it’s very difficult to let go of.”

Tottenham Hotspur centre-back Ashley Phillips is set to join Middlesbrough on a permanent deal.

An agreement has been reached consisting of an initial fee of around £7million, plus up to £13m in potential bonuses and add-ons, according to sources with knowledge of the deal, speaking on the condition of anonymity to protect relationships.

Personal terms are in place on a five-year deal and Phillips, 22, is scheduled to undergo a medical before completing the move.

The defender would become the second Spurs player to make a permanent switch to Middlesbrough this summer, following striker Will Lankshear, who joined in July.

Phillips joined Spurs from Blackburn in the summer of 2023 for around £3m but is set to depart without making his senior competitive debut for the club, after spending the last two and a half seasons on loan in the Championship.

He joined Plymouth Argyle for the second half of the 2023-24 campaign, winning the club’s young player of the year award, before making 83 appearances across the past two seasons at Stoke City.

Phillips’ Spurs contract had been due to run until 2028.

Spurs signed centre-back Jan Paul van Hecke from Brighton & Hove Albion in a £52m move this summer, before 19-year-old defender Luka Vuskovic moved in the opposite direction for £46m.

Middlesbrough, meanwhile, have had money to spend this summer after selling midfielder Hayden Hackney to Everton in July. The deal could rise to just under £25m ($33.3m) if all clauses, which are based on appearances, England selection and Everton’s qualification for European competition, are met.

The club are also due a significant sell-on fee from Morgan Rogers’ £117m move from Aston Villa to Chelsea, having inserted a 20 per cent sell-on clause in the deal that took the attacking midfielder from Teesside to Villa Park in January 2024.

Kim Hellberg’s side missed out on promotion to the Premier League last season after losing the play-off final to Hull City.