THE temperature is a stifling 30 degrees in the shade, the humidity is bordering on tropical, and the Newcastle Knights are sweating like sinners in church.
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The club’s new head of physical performance, Balin Cupples, is on a mission to extract every last drop of perspiration from them before this session is done. His job is to push bodies and minds to breaking point, whatever it takes. That’s what pre-seasons are for. Go hard, or go home.
Finally, begrudgingly, Cupples puts down the whip. Exhausted players form a huddle, exchange high-fives, and congratulate each other on a job well done.
Without even a second thought, they turn around for the familiar face they know will be there, in the right place at the right time, as always.
Club stalwart John Thomas is holding a tray of plastic squirt bottles, which he constantly fills and re-fills during the course of a day. It’s fair to assume he knows the ideal mix of Powerade and ice . . . it’s a job he’s been doing for the past 29 seasons.
It all started for “JT” back in 1991, when out of the blue he received a phone call from then Knights coach David Waite. The club needed to find a team manager for their Harold Matthews (under-15) squad at short notice. Would “Thommo” be interested?
Having served 10 years as secretary of the Valentine-Eleebana club and 25 years as treasurer of the Newcastle Schoolboys, he was a logical appointment.
His first assignment was over the June long weekend that season.
“I’ve never seen it rain so much in all my life,” he recalls with a laugh.
Twelve months later, Thomas was celebrating a Harold Matthews premiership, after Newcastle’s 16-12 win against South Sydney in the grand final.
After a few years with Matthews, he was promoted to Newcastle’s SG Ball (under-17) squad. He became so highly regarded that he was offered trips interstate and overseas with representative teams, including NSW under-19s and the Junior Kangaroos.
In 2000, while still heavily involved with the Knights’ lower grades, he took on the role of Newcastle’s NRL timekeeper – a position he held during the 2001 grand final against Parramatta.
As the Eels surged home in the second half, pegging back an apparently unassailable lead, Thomas had never been so anxious for the final seconds to elapse. Some nerve-jangling moments ensued before the Knights were crowned premiers after a 30-24 triumph.
Less than a year later, came another unexpected phone call from a head coach, this time Michael Hagan.
“Hages rang me from Melbourne,” Thomas says.
"Would you be interested in doing first grade?
“Well, I'd retired from the pit [Wallarah Colliery], and I wasn't really doing anything, so I could come every day.
"So that was when I started coming every day, which I've done ever since."
There have been six changes of coaches over the ensuing 18 seasons, but JT has been a constant presence as team manager.
When Wayne Bennett arrived in town in late 2011, his highly paid entourage initially decided Thomas would not be required on road trips.
It didn’t take the master coach long to reassess that decision, telling the club’s then owner, Nathan Tinkler: “Thommo has to travel with the team. The boys love him.”
It’s not hard to see why.
Every training session, every game day, he’s there before the players arrive and usually the last to leave.
Along with head trainer Jamie Williams (and formerly Williams’ long-serving predecessor Graham Perkins), he assembles the training equipment well before the first player has set foot on the pitch.
Afterwards, as the athletes stretch and cool down in the shade, he diligently collects the goal-post padding, singlets, footballs, bump pads and any other items that have been left behind.
Before every trip away, he helps load everything required into the team bus, and looks after logistics, such as providing players with menus so they can pre-order their meals. He’s been dealing with the same restaurateurs for so long now he’s on first-name basis with most of them.
For home games, if players want a few extra tickets for family members or friends, Thommo is the man who can pull strings.
At Mad Monday every year, he cooks the team barbecue. “I never have a drink at Mad Monday, but I've never had a drama,” he says. “The boys look after me.”
As former Knights coach Rick Stone once said of Thomas: “He’s like Radar O'Reilly in MASH, he's just one step ahead of most people and gets the jobs done that need to get done . . . [he’s] a bloke who has put his heart and soul into this club for the last 20 years."
Stone’s replacement, Nathan Brown, is equally appreciative of the role Thommo plays behind the scenes.
“Probably the best way to sum it up is the boys just love him,” Brown says.
“And JT probably loves the boys and the club as much as everyone loves him.
“When you think of first grade going and doing an activity somewhere, you know JT will be in and around it.
“As much as the game has become full-time professional, it still very much relies on the part-timers who know what the club is built on.
“Those type of guys are as important as anyone in the club.”
Knights skipper Mitchell Pearce describes the 75-year-old former publican-turned-coalminer as “a champion”, who players regard as both a mentor and a mate.
"Every club needs someone like JT,” Pearce says. "Being a new guy to the club, he took me under his wing and made me feel welcome.
"He's a real gentleman, and talking to some of the old club legends, they all hold him in the highest regard. He's one of those guys who helps hold the club together."
When rookies are promoted to Newcastle’s top-grade squad, Thommo greets them with some time-honoured advice. “I like to think I can teach the young blokes a few things,” he says. “One of the big ones is to have a firm handshake and look someone in the eye when you shake his hand."
Of all the hundreds of players JT has come to call friends over the years, he does admit to having some favourites. He was close to former skippers Danny Buderus and Kurt Gidley, and particularly tight with Jarrod Mullen.
“Bedsy was really good to me,” he says. “I remember one year he asked me if I’d ever been to the Dally Ms, and when I said no, he said: ‘Well, you’re coming to this one’.
“And Jarrod, I’ve known him since he was 12 years old.”
Mullen and former centre Dane Gagai, now with South Sydney, would surprise Thomas with free pairs of brand-new joggers, via their sponsor, Nike.
“Dane and me would bet for chocolates on his goal-kicking after training,” JT says.
The club’s greatest-ever tryscorer, Akuila Uate, was another youngster Thomas took under his wing.
“Aku was getting in trouble for being late for training, and they were making the other boys do extra training [as penance],” he recalls. “So I started calling him in the morning, just to make sure he was out of bed and would be on time.”
Thomas’s dedication was first formally recognised in 2010, when he was awarded life membership of the club. And then came an equally prestigious honour, when at the 2018 presentation dinner, he was named clubman of the year.
"I never gave it a thought," he says.
"The clubman award normally goes to a player. I think it was one of the first times a member of the staff got it.
"So it was a pretty special moment, mainly because of the way the players reacted. They gave me a bit of a standing ovation."
JT’s wife of almost 50 years, Carole, has spent most of their marriage as an uncomplaining “football widow”, although his only playing experience was a “couple of games in about 1956”, in the under-12s.
"I'd like to go at least one more year and get 30 years," Thomas says. "But it won't be up to me. They might decide I've reached my use-by date before then. I'd like to keep going, while I'm able, because I enjoy it."
It’s safe to assume Newcastle’s players would testify that the feeling is mutual.
