Pietersen apologises over texts

Kevin Pietersen has admitted to sending 'provocative' text messages to members of the South African team and issued an apology, the England and Wales Cricket Board have confirmed.

Pietersen was dropped by England for this week's third Test against the Proteas after failing to confirm publicly last weekend that no derogatory texts about his team-mates had been sent to South African players during the second Test, or if they had been sent, to apologise for them.

Pietersen has now apologised, saying in a statement released by the ECB: "I did send what you might call provocative texts to my close friends in the SA team. The texts were meant as banter between close friends."

He went on: "I need to rein myself in sometimes. I apologise to Straussy and the team for the inappropriate remarks at the press conference and for the texts. I truly didn't mean to cause upset or tension particularly with important games at stake."

England managing director Hugh Morris said: "We are in receipt of Kevin's apology, but further discussions need to take place to establish whether it is possible to regain the trust and mutual respect required to ensure all parties are able to focus on playing cricket and to maintain the unity of purpose that has served us so well in recent years.

"Critically, those discussions should take place behind closed doors, rather than in the media spotlight.

"A successful conclusion to this process is in everyone's best interests and is required for Kevin Pietersen's potential selection in all forms of the game to be considered.

"At the moment we have an important Investec Test match to focus on and therefore ECB will make no further comment until such time as is appropriate."

England trail 1-0 in the three-match series and will lose top spot in the world rankings if they fail to win the final Test against South Africa, which begins at Lord's on Thursday.