McClennan wrote:
Might be worth mentioning that Turner has made nearly 200 tackles less than Shenton and, for a supposed striker centre, has scored less tries this season than Willie Manu. Take out that one game against Rovers where he scored a hat trick, when they were struggling, and he has scored three tries in fourteen games.
It is a fair point that Turner makes a lot less tackles than Shenton, but that may be because Shenton is targeted as a specific weak link in Saints defensive armour. Statistically they both complete around 91% which is pretty poor.
I suspect we will see Turner targeted next year on the right at Saints and be forced to do more defensive work.
I personally would never describe Turner as a strike centre. Such guys are people who score 20 trys+ a season.
For me Turner is a solid player who will provide "more bang for the buck", particularly going forward.
In a salary capped world Shenton comes into the category of under performing Luxury player. We cant afford to keep such players on our books. The money is better spent going to promising youngsters eg Josh Jones, or other star players who are coming up with the goods on a week by week basis.