The fact Johnston, 26, has taken a three-point lead at the top of the leaderboard eight weeks into the battle for the McDonald's-Hawke's Bay Today Club Rugby Player of the Year award is a tremendous achievement considering the number of quality players in his team and the fact the Green Machine missed one game with a default win.
Like so many spectators at Tremain Field, Johnston, who was also the week five winner in this award, didn't expect his team to be so dominant.
"We knew what Tech would bring so we changed a few things. Our forwards were so relentless at the breakdown and with Ellery [Magpies halfback Wilson] so fit and playing the best rugby of his career were able to dictate a pretty fast tempo and play some outstanding footy."
Johnston agreed his fellow loosies, blindside flanker Ricky Hayes and No 8 Hannon Brighouse, have matured so much it makes it easy for him to focus on his job.
"We are lucky we have a large group of players who have been together for a long time. We are a quite tight group who don't get caught up in the hype ... everyone does their job and everyone does the basics well."
Jizzle (Johnston's nickname) pointed out there was plenty of talk before the final suggesting NOBM's tight five may struggle against the Texans.
"Those boys stood up in a massive way and I'm sure our scrum only had a couple of lapses."
A one-season Texan, Johnston, heaped praise on his team's rookie hooker, 20-year-old Jack Nelson-Murray, who pushed his skipper hard for player-of-the-match honours.
"It was a high pressure occasion for Jack playing his fourth game in this position in a final and he delivered. Being a former No 7 he was good over the ball and had a huge workrate. I'm picking him and Ricky [Hayes] to be the bolters when the Magpies Mitre 10 Cup squad is named later in the season."
Naturally Johnston hopes his name will be among those to be read out too. But he isn't looking that far ahead and hopes to be selected for the next pre-season encounter against Wairarapa Bush on Queen's Birthday to push his case more.
Wider training group members had this week and last week off and will resume training next week in the countdown to the Featherston trip.
With the Nash Cup in back in NOBM's bulging trophy cabinet Johnston and his troops attention will turn to their mission to retain the more prestigious Maddison Trophy. They will host Tamatea in a round one fixture on Saturday.
Former Waikato Development team member Johnston expressed disappointment that his team didn't meet Auto Super Shoppe Hastings Rugby and Sports during the revamped Nash Cup round. He called for an earlier start to the club season next year to allow another round before the semifinals and he wanted to see competition points allocated for the crossover game.
"We start training in October so starting the Nash Cup comp one week earlier isn't going to make that much difference."
It's obvious this Tauranga Boys' College old boy could make as much impact as an administrator of the game as he has on the paddock for NOBM when the time comes to retire from playing. That's if he doesn't decide to take up refereeing first ... he would be pretty good at that too.
Best & fairest
NOBM v Napier Technical: 3, Chris Johnston (NOBM); 2, Jack Nelson-Murray (NOBM); 1, Saia Paese (NOBM).
Leaderboard: 12 points: Chris Johnston (NOBM). 9: Johnny Ika (MAC). 8: Aleki Vuki (Hastings). 6: Hannon Brighouse (NOBM), Mark Braidwood (Tech). 5: JJ Taulagi (Tech), Sam Weber (NOBM), Danny Toala (Hastings), Lincoln McClutchie (Tamatea).
