INTERVIEW: BRENDAN VENTER: DONALD MCRAEtalks to the 40-year-old director of rugby at Saracens who manages to combine his current role with a continuing immersion in his medical practice at home in Cape Town

“I’M A doctor rather than a coach,” Brendan Venter says calmly, “and so we don’t look to win matches. We look towards performing at a really high level. Winning is just a consequence of our reaching that level. It’s a simple philosophy. You can’t think about winning all the time. I’m far more interested in my players, along with me, improving as people. That’s basically the only thing that really matters. There’s nothing else.”

In the narrow and insular world of professional sport, Venter emerges as a rare presence. The 40-year-old director of rugby at Saracens combines his current role with a continuing immersion in his medical practice at home in Cape Town. Medicine is his primary passion; and yet there is hardly a more committed coach in English rugby. Venter burns with such passion that the South African has been subjected to bans and fines for altercations with opposition fans and for scathing criticism of referees.

The thought arises that Venter would be a terrifyingly intense figure if rugby ever became more than just a secondary interest to a man who prides himself most on being a good doctor.

Instead, he reveals a singular coaching approach which includes him insisting his players study in further education. Venter also makes them write essays and indulge in the occasional boozy weekend as he seeks to create more thoughtful and rounded individuals who bind together as a unified squad.

Saracens meet Leinster at Wembley on Saturday, in a Heineken Cup group match they desperately need to win after being defeated away by Clermont Auvergne three days ago, but Venter, having arrived back in England yesterday morning, after a week in South Africa to mark a bereavement he describes as “a family tragedy”, speaks philosophically.

“Listen, rugby is a game of small battles and you need to win the majority of them. But even if you do that you can still lose the game if you don’t take your opportunities. That’s obviously what happened when we lost to Clermont. It sounds as if we did really well throughout the game but we let things slip.”

Venter laid out a bold strategy in an attempt to beat a team who have not lost at home for nearly a year. Saracens attacked Clermont relentlessly, running the ball from deep, and they dominated the first hour of a match they finally lost 25-10 after conceding some soft tries.

Crucially, while in overwhelming control of possession, they missed numerous try-scoring openings and relatively simple kicks at goal.

“I’ve not seen the game yet,” Venter says, “but we only had to make 83 tackles the whole match. In our last three Premiership games we made 83 tackles before the end of the first half. So, obviously, Clermont didn’t play much rugby. Against Leinster we’ll need to be much sharper – but we’ve won every single one of our games at Wembley.”

Venter is at the heart of a South African-led strategy to transform Saracens from a big-talking but under-performing club into an English and European powerhouse. Last season, his first at the club, Saracens only just lost a pulsating Premiership final to Leicester. Their growing desire to find a more glamorous London setting is now central to their huge ambition.

But until they can find a permanent new stadium to replace their rundown and rented home at Watford’s Vicarage Road, Saracens will continue to hire Wembley for significant matches. This chimes with their belief that, under Venter, Saracens can now compete seriously in both the Premiership and Europe.

“That’s why the Leinster game is important,” Venter concedes. “But it’s not as important as our overall philosophy that rugby is just a tool to make friendships and to improve your character. If you understand that you will play with real commitment and pride.”

This might sound curious in the unremitting world of professional sport – where grinding out results and trading in cliches defines a conservative world. But Venter is an evangelical and radical coach who makes his players study and improve themselves academically.

“This is the benefit of being a head coach. You are in a position that you can influence people. All players want to be famous and make money. And I tell them the only way they’re going to do that is by doing it my way. Look, it’s not optional. I’ve said to them: ‘If you don’t study it will count against you.’ Absolutely. We introduced this last year already. We can’t say this is the kind of player we want if you make 50 tackles a game, and carry the ball so often, but you don’t study and explore outside interests. In the long term we won’t benefit from you if you don’t broaden yourself as a person.

“We had them write an essay about the ideal 20-year-old. We had them describe, in their own words, what the ideal 20-year-old would look like. How does the ideal 20-year-old treat women? How does the ideal 20-year-old treat alcohol? How does he handle his finances? How does he deal with life in general?

“We had them all write an essay and then we put it all together and said this is the information you’ve given us – and this is what we all want. We want you to strive to be good people.”

How did his players react to essay writing? “They all surprised me. The academy players were especially fantastic. They never cease to amaze me. They’re bright, they’re sharp, they’re intelligent, they’re hardworking.”

Have his senior players also accepted the apparently non-negotiable stipulation that they will write essays and pursue educational courses?

“Absolutely. The players have cottoned on to this idea that rugby is just one part of their life. If all the other areas of their life are in good shape then their rugby will also be in good shape. But if their relationships, or their finances, are in bad shape there’s no way they’ll be successful as rugby players. So there is a hidden agenda behind it as well. It’s not just that we want to develop good people. We want to produce successful rugby players. I struggle to be a good doctor if my personal life is in disarray. That’s the simple principle we use.”

After he had been such a successful player, and then a coach, at London Irish, Venter was convinced he would not return to English rugby. But, having been pursued by Saracens’ South African consortium, led by their chief executive, Edward Griffiths, Venter finally relented.

“They’d asked me for quite a while if I’d be prepared to come back. But I was so settled as a doctor in South Africa I said no. Coaching is my secondary passion. But, in the end, they convinced me.

“And coaching is interesting because you can influence people in a good or bad way. It’s the same as being a doctor where you see 40 people a day and you’re in a wonderful position to change their lives – and the way they see things.

“The reason I’m a good doctor is not that I’m an especially clever doctor. But I really care for my patients and compassion is the only ingredient you really require. We all make mistakes as doctors and coaches but if you really care for the people you deal with then you will always be successful.

“But it’s a two-way process. It’s not just me giving things to other people. I receive a lot in return.”

Venter also receives a lot of flak and disciplinary retribution for his scathing candour and apparently idiosyncratic choices. Last season he missed the Premiership’s Twickenham final because he was found guilty of misconduct and given a 14-week ban after a dispute with Leicester fans who complained he was blocking their view at Welford Road. And a few weeks ago he incensed the authorities and sponsors when he instructed his captain, Steve Borthwick, to miss the Heineken Cup launch and, instead, enjoy a beer festival in Munich with his team-mates.

“I find it amazing when people over-react to these things. When something serious happens then by all means make something of it. But the Leicester thing was just a massive storm in a tea-cup. It’s unbelievable. If that little thing deserved a punishment then, holy moly, I don’t know. I didn’t hit anyone, I didn’t show a finger to them. In fact I wasn’t even cross with them. But what’s done is done.”

That same desire to move ahead explains why Venter is so reluctant to celebrate his own past as a player – and most notably South Africa’s historic World Cup win in 1995. In front of Nelson Mandela and a deliriously united country, Venter came on in the second half of a momentous final against New Zealand.

“It just washed over me,” he says, “but everything we do in life washes over us. It happened but then so did the next thing, and the next. It was all a long time ago.”

Has he seen Invictus, Clint Eastwood’s romantic version of that World Cup win in post-apartheid South Africa?

“I did and I actually enjoyed it. The rugby parts were poor but I thought the storyline was quite good. It brought back a lot of memories of how the country was reunited. I never think about the World Cup so when I watched the movie I remembered a lot. But I’m more interested in now.

“The interesting thing is that I coach solely because I believe I can have a positive impact on people. I don’t have to be a doctor to make a difference to people’s lives. My brother said to me this weekend that we all basically play the starring role in our own little drama of life. And our ability to put somebody else in that starring role for a little while is a skill.

“And that’s how you make other people better.

“So we should never underestimate rugby coaching. I might be doctor before anything else but, as a coach, I can still make a difference. It’s important to remember that.”

• Guardian Service