Reconsidering The Relationship of Popular Culture and Football on Mohamed Salah

The football is a popular sport, which is played, watched and followed by millions of people. It is not even regarded as a sports branch in many countries, but as a different reality. Football is an event type, in which large masses make use of their leisure time. In addition, football can be regarded as the producer of popular culture with its feature, which generates new popular products in a constantly renewing and changing structure of popular culture. Everyone in the football world, especially footballers and football managers by writing their autobiographies, continue to create popular culture contents. Mohamed Salah has been shown as one of the most popular footballers in the world due to his impressive performance and has become an important icon. The most basic feature, which distinguishes Salah from other popular footballers, is that he is a Muslim and is accepted as a hero in a country like England where Christian values are prevalent. Mohamed Salah, who is a role model for many young people today, has become an icon with both his performance on the pitch and living on the out of pitch. In this study, Mohamed Salah was selected as case (example) and tried to be evaluated in the context of some criteria. Mohamed Salah were evaluated in three categories: biography and sporting achievements, islamic figure and popular culture icon. Multiple data sources were used in the study. The literature was used to understand the relationship between popular culture and football; and the news about him in the world media was used to evaluate Mohamed Salah in determined criteria. The case study was used in the study. Case studies enable to probe a subject with particular features. In this study, the relations between popular culture and football were discussed and Mohamed Salah was tried to be analysed with a descriptive method as a popular cultural icon by taking advantage of multiple data sources. In the light of the data obtained from the study, it was concluded that the popular culture may have a connective and integrative effect in some cases. When viewed from this angle, it can be said that popular culture disseminates a common understanding for people, provides a cultural partnership and has an integrative role.