Shane Warne

Auckland: A New Zealand newspaper Sunday said it had been the target of a legal warning and a public relations offensive after it began investigating allegations involving Australian cricket star Shane Warne and a text message.

The Sunday News said it had received a call offering an off-field story about Warne for NZ $30,000 and the approaches began before it had completed its investigations or sought comment from the player.

The enquiry centred on the alleged sending of a text message when Warne was in Wellington earlier this year.

The lawyer?s letter, published by the newspaper, said: ?Without knowing the content (and alleged recipient) of a particular message, Mr Warne is unable to confirm whether he sent it.?

?That aside, however, personal text messages sent between any two parties are private and confidential in nature, and may not be published without the consent of those parties.?

A former New Zealand cricket star, which the newspaper did not identify, had also made approaches ?effectively asking us to stop our inquiries?, while a woman claiming to represent Warne?s interests in New Zealand wanted to know details of the investigation, the Sunday News said.

A spokesman for the Australian cricket team said they were looking into the matter.

Warne, Test cricket?s most successful wicket-taker, has been a controversial figure off the field.

In 1995, he was fined along with teammate Mark Waugh for his alleged involvement with an Indian bookmaker.

While playing for English county Hampshire in 2000, a British tabloid told of how Warne had left ?dirty messages? on the answer phone of a nurse he had met in a nightclub.

South African woman Helen Cohen Alon also claimed in August 2003 that she was offered $28,000 by an associate of Warne to keep quiet about their relationship in a series of threatening phone calls and text messages.

Warne hit rock-bottom after being given a 12-month suspension for taking a banned diuretic just before the 2003 World Cup.

Earlier this year he revealed in a television documentary how he fled with his wife to Spain to save their marriage after an affair with a Melbourne stripper.