Tom is my favourite player. As a fan since 1996 he has provided the most entertainment from my perspective. He will be a huge loss for this club if it happens. It’s all conjecture at this stage.

If he leaves he has given the club hood service and I will follow his progress but I really hope he stays. Players like Tom don’t come along often especially to clubs like ours.

Murphy looks to me like he could be a good standard SL winger. The saving Grace for trinity is that it is investing in the young players. That will pay dividends in the coming years I have no doubt.

Think toppo just played for Hull for 2 years same as K Harkin Most Wakey fans were glad he went to Hull .After all the time he had given to Wakefield they were happy to see toppo to go out on a high .Know if T J does leave will not be as bigger blow as could have been with young Murphy coming through More worried about the other wing .We got to get Kay back to hooker big time

He was there 4 years and lead them through their most successful years. He was 32 when he went to Hull.
They got Fred Ah Kuoi to replace him and he went to Oldham which picked up their fortunes. Then he came back to us at 38 ish.

After 12-13 years at the club he deserved some success but as far as I know it was the club cashing in not him jumping ship.

If I remember correctly D topliss was sold to hull for £15000 and N Stephenson brought for £18000 so the club didn't really cash in,probably D topliss was fed up with the goings on at the club like we all were.

It was a massive fire sale after the Wembley final of 1979 T skerrett to hull £40000 world record at the time Rayners twins both to Leeds £35000 and £38000 A mcurrie oldham £40000 B juliff wigan £25000 S diamond fulham £20000 G Idle Bradford £25000 A kelly HKR £60000 big money at the time.

It would be big money for us now!

Tom is a fantastic attacking player that there is no doubt defensively maybe not but if he was to go part of me wont be dissappointed as i could only assume one of if not our best played player and for a club with our spend we need our best payed on the pitch and we just dont get that tom.although i will be slightly annoyed as we has a club have looked after him through all these lengthy injuries for him to leave for free

To me a player has 10 to 15 years in a career and although annoyed when people leave us for so called bigger clubs you cant begrudge anybody moving on if they feel the need to have a higher salary or greater chance of silverware you are a long time retired in our game so i would be really happy if he stays more than happy if he can chance his arm in nrl mildly happy with a move to saints wigan or warrington but less happy if its leeds cas or shudds

I’m sure we could have a good discussion about this but I don’t think it is a presupposition - it’s just an opinion.
Then, as you say, I justify my opinion with a fact - would you care to dispute it? Then I offer another opinion.
You seem to think I’m having a tantrum, I think I’m right. Offer an alternative opinion/counter argument or just live with it.

At the end of the day it will depend on Tom on how amphibious he is, you can't knock him for his loyalty to the club nor his effort on the field when it's reliant on his skill to keep us out of the mire.
If the club thought this out we could get a decent pay out while he's still under contract otherwise we end up doing the dumb thing and let him go for free.
Personally I'd sit down with him openly ask him how he feels about staying with the club trophy less or if he wants to move would he help the club financially if he does move on it wouldn't matter to where he went.
I'd sell him on with his agreement

I think he can swim but don't know how well.

Which is pretty much what Kyle Amor did.
Kyle had just over a year left on his contract and was attracting a lot of interest from other clubs who were challenging for honours
He told the club he wouldn’t be signing another contract but would honour his current one or would go immediately if the club could get a transfer fee for him, which we did.

Snowie's right. I'd hate to see TJ leave the club but he has to think about his own career. He won't get international honours on the back of the occasional spectacular game for Trinity. He needs consistency - not Trinity's strong point.

Im just watching St George Illawarra against the Knights, if Johnstone goes to the NRL St George’s stadium is right on the beach. That should suit Johnstone’s needs

I beg to differ.
There is no doubting Tom's ability on the field, he is consistent, and he doesn't score the 'occasional' spectacular try he scores regular spectacular tries!
The consistency that Tom needs is to be injury free for a lengthy time, but it's a result of the fearless way he plays that the injuries occur.
IMO Tom Johnstone is the best winger in SL. Makinson gets lots of praise with Saints, and rightly so, but there's not much between him and Tom - ok I'm biased but I would say Tom has the edge, because I believe he is probably faster than Makinson

That’s the WIN stadium in Wollongong… the stadium of the former Illawarra Steelers who were lost in the merger with St George … who’s main stadium is in Kograh about 30/40 minutes walk from Brighton Beach at Botany Bay…

I lived in The Gong for half a dozen years… and regularly walked the dogs behind the stadium and on the dog friendly beach just to the south of the stadium and all the way to port Kembla harbour.

However if tJ were to go to the NRL I would recommend Melbourne a very structured team where he would be well looked after. And it’s not near the beach!!

Completely agree about Melbourne, Bellamy is the best coach in the game and his record for developing players is outstanding, Tom would flourish under Bellamy. Crucially Tom has that one element that Bellamy loves in his wingers ‘speed’. Just look at how many opportunities they create for their edge finishers.

Some SL stats on wingers

Tries:
Tommy Makinson: 11
Ken Sio: 11
Josh Charnley: 8
Greg Eden: 7
Tom Johnstone: 7
Ryan Hall: 5
Ash Handley: 5
Jermaine McGillvary: 4
Matty Russell: 4
Adam Swift: 3
Liam Marshall: 3
Tom Davies: 1

Tries per game:
Tommy Makinson: 1.6
Ken Sio: 1.6
Greg Eden: 1.4
Josh Charnley: 1.33
Tom Johnstone: 0.88
Ryan Hall: 0.63
Ash Handley: 0.63
Jermaine McGillvary: 0.57
Matty Russell: 0.5
Liam Marshall: 0.43
Adam Swift: 0.375
Tom Davies: 0.14

Metres:
Tommy Makinson: 1326 (highest in the competition from any player)
Ash Handley: 1063
Tom Johnstone: 1063
Ryan Hall: 1056
Tom Davies: 1040
Ken Sio: 988
Jermain McGillvary: 918
Adam Swift: 879
Matty Russell: 834
Greg Eden: 644
Liam Marshall: 589
Josh Charnley: 425

Average gain:
Tommy Makinson: 10.61 metres per carry
Ken Sio: 9.88 metres per carry
Tom Johnstone: 9.49 metres per carry
Jermaine McGillvary: 9.18 metres per carry
Greg Eden: 9.07 metres per carry
Tom Davies: 8.52 metres per carry
Ash Handley: 8.44 metres per carry
Ryan Hall: 8.06 metres per carry
Adam Swift: 7.85 metres per carry
Matty Russell: 7.51 metres per carry
Liam Marshall: 7.27 metres per carry
Josh Charnley: 6.44 metres per carry

Clean Breaks:
Tommy Makinson: 14 (highest in the competition from any player)
Tom Johnstone: 11
Greg Eden: 10
Ryan Hall: 10
Adam Swift: 7
Ash Handley: 5
Ken Sio: 5
Matty Russell: 5
Josh Charnley: 5
Jermaine McGillvary: 4
Tom Davies: 3
Liam Marshall: 2

Makinson is a class winger and has been for some time, but the best way to compare is to imagine how good Makinson would look in the various Trinity teams of the past 6/7 years and how good Johnstone would look in a dominant St Helens team. Certainly the stats would be reversed at the least in my view.

Alternately, imagine Johnstone and Makinson in the same team next year

Sell Tom with Murphy an able replacement and use the funds to get Andrew Fifita in next season….

Nah, wont happen - we couldn’t afford Makinson

He’s off contract at the end of the year so we’ll get nothing for him. He’s either staying or going, the club will probably know either way by now and will have plans in place for either his stay or departure. If he goes it will be bitter sweet, we’ve never seen him play consistently due to an array of injury issues, which is a shame but I should imagine he’ll be one of our top earners? As a club of our stature can we afford to have one of our highest earner sat in the stands consistently season after season (genuinely no offence to the player, I think he’s the best winger in my time watching, when playing) just saying from a buisness point of view, if he left the money could be used else where ie in the front row. I’ll be happy if he resigns and disappointed if he left but not deflated.

Jesus Christ, good job your not in charge

From a purely selfish point I'd love Tom to stay and just get a bit of luck with injuries and have a season or two free of them...an outstanding player.

On the other hand, from an unselfish point think a move would do him the world of good. Nobody could begrudge him that, he's been extremely loyal when other teams have come knocking in the past.

I know Makinson is getting all the current headlines but as those stats above show TJ has done it in a generally struggling side whereas Makinson is playing in a team that's been dominant for so long...as others have said...Makinson at Wakey for the last 5 years and Johnstone at Saints and TJ would blow his stats out of the water for me...it sounds totally wrong coming from a fan of us but if he was to move I'd actually like to see him go to Saints and really realise his full potential...stay injury free, win things and be a star at International level...he deserves it...