England are hurting over Stanford's wife flirting

Texan billionaire Sir Allen Stanford was shown on TV flirting with the partners of several of the England team including Matt Prior's pregnant wife while England were playing Middlesex in a warm-up game for this weekend's £10million clash against the West Indian Superstars.

The incident has given the competition more bad headlines, with the players already struggling to adapt to the slow pitch and poor floodlighting.

Middlesex dropped three high catches last night as they lost out on a $300,000 pay day by losing to Trinidad by five wickets.

Stanford kept a low profile at the ground last night after some members of Pietersen's team were said to be upset by the images from Sunday, which not only appeared on televisions around the world but were also shown on the two giant TV screens inside the ground, with a shot of Prior's pregnant partner, Emily, sitting on the Texan billionaire's knee causing most offence.

One unnamed player has been quoted as saying: "If that was my wife he'd put on his lap I would have wanted to punch him."

A spokesman for Stanford stressed today, however, that the businessman had telephoned Pietersen, as captain of the team, and Prior to apologise for the "incident" while England say the matter is "closed."

"He understood that the players were not particularly pleased with the incident and as a result of that he apologised," said the Stanford representative.

Middlesex skipper Shaun Udal did collect a cheque for 100,000 dollars last night but Trinidad skipper Daren Ganga pocketed three times that amount after his team's victory.

"When it came to it on the big occasion we just weren't quite up to it," admitted Udal. "When you get such a small total [117] you are always up against it. We got early wickets but then we dropped two or three catches that were crucial."