On Friday night, there will likely be six.

As long as everything goes right (and with these two it always does) Johnathan Thurston and Cameron Smith, two of the great players in the game’s history, will also pass one of the true point scoring milestones within hours of each other.

Thurston is stuck on 1999 while Smith is on 1997 and they’ll join Darryl Halligan, Jason Taylor, Andrew Johns and Hazem El Masri in the most rarefied air of rugby league pointscoring.

Both players have scored their fair share of tries. Thurston’s 75 tries is the fourth highest total in Cowboys history and with 85 in total there’s a possibility he joins Allan Langer, Greg Alexander, Brad Fittler, Phil Blake and Terry Lamb as the only halves to pass that milestone.

Smith won’t catch Danny Buderus, the most prolific tryscoring hooker of the modern age with 63 but his 40 touchdowns is a respectable total for any dummy half.

But the bulk of their points come from kicks and while both have approached this rarefied air at the same time, their styles could not be more different.

Thurston has the more bizarre style, the more spectacular. His trademark curve is unlike any other kicker in the “round the corner” era, often bending kicks into impossible angles to swing them between the posts.

Halligan, the first man to crack the 2000-point barrier and perhaps the greatest kicker the game has ever seen in this country, says embracing his own idiosyncrasies is part of what makes Thurston so effective.

“Technically, JT is very different to everyone else in the comp.

“He’s the lone standing ‘pivoted’, the guy whose plant foot pretty much lands beside the ball and doesn’t move.

“The rest of the comp all have a little bit of movement forward at the ball whereas JT can just manufacture a pivot-like kick. He’s mastered the technique.”

Taming his natural curve on the ball forms the basis of Thurston’s kicking style — he told Fox Sports in 2013 “I need to aim a fair bit right (of the posts) on both sides. I can take it if I miss to the right of the posts but I can’t stand missing to the left because that means I haven’t given enough room for my hook.”

The peaks and intensity of Thurston’s pointscoring eclipses Smith. Thurston’s personal best for points in a match is 24, which he’s done twice, and he’s scored 20 points or more six times. Smith has only cracked the 20 point barrier twice.

The Cowboys man also four seasons of scoring 200 points or more to Smith’s zero, over twice as many tries (85 to 40) and the better success rate off the tee (a career rate of 79.46per cent to 73.2per cent and a single season high of 86per cent to 83.87per cent).

But Smith makes up the distance in unerring, unyielding, unending consistency.

Both players became fulltime kickers in 2006. Since then Smith has scored between 142 and 194 points in every single season. His success rate has gotten as high as 82.87per cent in 2011 and as low as 69.37per cent in 2008 but invariably settles around the mid 70s. Injury kept Thurston to just 94 points in 2008 and 95 in 2010, but Smith is unbreakable, playing at least 20 matches in every season since 2002.

The 917 goals Smith has kicked in his career, almost 100 more than Thurston’s 822, is the equal second highest total of all time alongside Andrew Johns and if this season continues as usual he’ll pass all-time record holder Jason Taylor on 942. Kicking 1000 goals is well within the realms of possibility.

Smith’s kicking style lacks the flash of Thurston’s, but that robotic consistency is what sets him apart from the rest and Halligan nominated Smith’s character as his best attribute as a kicker.

“He doesn’t seem to get flustered when he’s goalkicking at all. He doesn’t seem to think anything’s too much of a problem at all.

“He’s got a pretty compact style and an easy strike on the ball.

“He’s actually a pretty talented kicker with his right foot, he’s certainly not devoid of skill.”

What makes Smith’s style all the more remarkable is he was never a kicker growing up and was only pitched into the role when Matt Orford went down with injury. He assumed the kicking duties full time when Orford left in 2006.

“I never think about my fatigue. The main thing you can have when you are tired is your concentration,” Smith told the Herald Sun in 2012.

“So it’s more about mentally being switched on about what you need to do rather than knowing you’ve got enough energy to get it over the crossbar.

“I always know I have enough energy in the tank to get it to the posts. So it’s about concentrating and making sure you are following the right steps, your technique.”

It’s a sentiment echoed by Halligan, who has worked with Smith in his capacity as a goalkicking coach.

“I’ve got a really good memory, but you only want to remember the ones you kicked. You never want to remember the ones you missed.

“I always embraced it that way.

“You’ve got move on really quickly. If you sit and dwell on something that was a negative experience it’ll stay with you too long.”

Kicking is a lonely job. It takes hours of practice just to become a good kicker, let alone a great one. When someone takes a shot at goal it’s the only moment where a team game becomes an individual sport. Every highlight in rugby league involves at least two people, except for goalkicking.

The match, the crowd, the fans, everything stops for a moment and focuses on one man, the ball and the posts. That pressure and the intensity of that spotlight can break you if you let it.

“You either relish it or you fear it” says Halligan.

“It’s easier once you get accustomed to it. Early on I think everyone fears it, in a way, then you realise its something you’re delivering back to the team.

“It’s an individual skill you practice on your own, notwithstanding what anyone else is doing, you deliver this back to the team. It’s not a collective thing that the team does together.

“I always embraced it that way.”

Halligan surpassed Mick Cronin as the game’s leading pointscorer in 2000 and was passed by Taylor in 2001.

The Magpies, Bears and Eels halfback had the record for five years until Andrew Johns took the crown in 2006. He was top of the heap until 2009 when Hazem El Masri, Halligan’s one-time backup, surpassed him

Smith and Thurston could both pass El Masri’s total of 2418 if they play at least two more seasons beyond 2017 and Thurston is already the most prolific pointscorer in Test (372) and State of Origin (214) history.

Of the current players, James Maloney (1512) and Jarrod Croker (1424) are the two most likely to pass 2000. Croker’s try-scoring prowess, durability and age means he has an excellent chance of passing everyone and finishing his career as rugby league’s all-time pointscoring king.

However, the British totals tower over those from the Southern Hemisphere.

Recently retired Leeds legend Kevin Sinfield scored an obscene 3967 points from 521 matches for the Rhinos from 1997 to 2015. His goalkicking totals alone — 1792 goals and 28 field goals, or 3612 points eclipse anything produced in Australia.

Pat Richards scored 2468 points in 244 games for Wigan from 2006-13, more than El Masri’s career total.

Going further into the past however, we find the greatest point scoring product the sport has ever produced, British legend Neil Fox.

Fox scored a mind-bending 6220 points during his long career with Wakefield, Bradford Northern, Hull KR, York, Bramley and Huddersfield from 1956 to 1979.

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