{"id":786630,"date":"2026-09-29T18:38:09","date_gmt":"2026-09-29T18:38:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/786630\/"},"modified":"2026-09-29T18:38:09","modified_gmt":"2026-09-29T18:38:09","slug":"brendan-venter-saracens-face-fines-after-director-of-rugby-refuses-media-commitments","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/786630\/","title":{"rendered":"Brendan Venter: Saracens face fines after director of rugby refuses media commitments"},"content":{"rendered":"

Saracens are set to receive a series of fines from Prem Rugby due to director of rugby Brendan Venter’s failure to fulfil media commitments.<\/p>\n

It is understood the club have already been handed a \u00a35,000 sanction after Venter was not present at the Prem’s pre-season launch day.<\/p>\n

The South African also did not speak to the media before, during or after the opening-weekend victory<\/a> at Leicester.<\/p>\n

The Daily Telegraph reported earlier on Tuesday, external<\/a> that Venter “resigned” as director of rugby last month and took up a new role of “head of rugby culture and wine consultant”, with head coach Joe Shaw assuming responsibility for media commitments.<\/p>\n

The report also claims Saracens asked permission in July for Shaw to front the club’s media commitments.<\/p>\n

However, none of this has been confirmed by the club nor Prem Rugby.<\/p>\n

It is also thought a change of job title would not preclude Venter from his contractual responsibilities.<\/p>\n

Saracens announced in January that Venter would be returning to the club<\/a> as director of rugby and have yet to confirm any change to his day-to-day responsibilities.<\/p>\n

He succeeded Mark McCall, who stepped down at the end of last season after 15 trophy-laden years in the job.<\/p>\n

Venter’s first spell as Sarries’ director of rugby, which began in 2009, also included clashes with authorities over media commitments.<\/p>\n

In September 2010, the club apologised to European Rugby Cup (ERC) officials for then-captain Steve Borthwick’s failure to attend the Heineken Cup launch at Cardiff’s Millennium Stadium.<\/p>\n

Borthwick, now England head coach, was the only missing representative from the coaches and captains of 12 English, Welsh and Scottish clubs attending the event.<\/p>\n

He had been told by Saracens to instead attend a team bonding session at a beer festival in Munich.<\/p>\n

In December 2010, Venter himself was warned by European Rugby Cup officials for a post-match interview<\/a> after his side’s 24-21 Heineken Cup loss to Racing Metro, in which he repeatedly gave short answers, agreeing with whatever was being asked.<\/p>\n

He later said it was inspired by a scene in the football mockumentary film, Mike Bassett: England Manager.<\/p>\n

Venter left his full-time role at Saracens halfway through the 2010\u201311 season, to be replaced by McCall.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Saracens are set to receive a series of fines from Prem Rugby due to director of rugby Brendan…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":786631,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[5903,101,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-786630","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-rugby","tag-rugby","tag-sports","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/786630","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=786630"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/786630\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/786631"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=786630"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=786630"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=786630"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}