The top Super League try-scorer in every season from 1996 to the present day
Lesley Vainikolo (left), Pat Richards (centre) & Tommy Makinson (right) have all scooped the Super League top try-scorer accolade in years gone by - Alamy
2023 saw the accolade of Super League’s top try scorer shared between two players for the first time in 12 years, with Wigan Warriors & Catalans Dragons’ wingers Abbas Miski & Tom Johnstone both grabbing 27.
In fact, it was just the third time in the competition’s 28-year history that the top two try-scorers have both ended the season on the same figure.
Before this term, 2011 saw Ryan Hall & Sam Tomkins, then of Leeds Rhinos & Wigan Warriors, share the honour having finished on 28 tries each. St Helens team-mates Sean Long & Tommy Martyn also ended the year on the same tally in 2000 with 22 apiece.
To this day, no one has scored more Super League tries in a single season than Castleford Tigers’ Denny Solomona in 2016 with a whopping 40. Please note that tally does include the Super 8s fixtures, so he scored 40 tries in 30 games, which is still not bad going! Other play-off games aren’t counted.
At the other end of the scale, the lowest tally for the top try scorer came in the 2020 season, heavily impacted by the COVID-19 Pandemic which began in the March. Each team should have played 29 games, and that was reduced to 20, but no club got through all of those in the end.
Ash Handley grabbed 15 tries for Leeds Rhinos in the 17 they got through, and that was enough to see him end as the division’s top scorer that year.
Super League’s top try-scorer in every season from 1996 to the present day: The run down
The full list of Super League’s top try scorers, by year, is below:
1996 – Paul Newlove – St Helens – 28
1997 – Nigel Vagana – Warrington Wolves – 17
1998 – Anthony Sullivan – St Helens – 20
1999 – Toa Kohe-Love – Warrington Wolves – 25
2000 – Sean Long & Tommy Martyn – St Helens – 22
2001 – Kris Radlinski – Wigan Warriors – 27
2002 – Dennis Moran – London Broncos – 22
2003 – Dennis Moran – London Broncos – 24
2004 – Lesley Vainikolo – Bradford Bulls – 36
2005 – Mark Calderwood – Leeds Rhinos – 27
2006 – Justin Murphy – Catalans Dragons – 25
2007 – Henry Fa’afili – Warrington Wolves – 21
2008 – Ade Gardner – St Helens – 26
2009 – Ryan Hall – Leeds Rhinos – 29
2010 – Pat Richards – Wigan Warriors – 29
2011 – Ryan Hall & Sam Tomkins – Leeds Rhinos & Wigan Warriors – 28
2012 – Josh Charnley – Wigan Warriors – 31
2014 – Joel Monaghan – Warrington Wolves – 28
2015 – Jermaine McGillvary – Huddersfield Giants – 27
2016 – Denny Solomona – Castleford Tigers – 40
2017 – Greg Eden – Castleford Tigers – 38
2018 – Ben Barba – St Helens – 28
2019 – Tommy Makinson – St Helens – 23
2020 – Ash Handley – Leeds Rhinos – 15
2021 – Ken Sio – Salford Red Devils – 18
2022 – Bevan French – Wigan Warriors – 31
2023 – Abbas Miski & Tom Johnstone – Wigan Warriors & Catalans Dragons – 27
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