The following is a transcription of a message left on Kevin Pietersen's answering machine, voicemail, and various other devices by Andrew Strauss:

Hey K-Man! KP! K-Petey, K-Pity, heheheh. 

Hey Kevin!

Andrew Strauss here. Remember me? Ol' Straussy? Opening bat for England? Your captain for a few matches? Some people used to call me Muppet?

Well nowadays, people call me DIRECTOR OF CRICKET.

How've you been doing? Cricket at Surrey sounds good. What was your last score for them... 2 runs, wasn't it?

At least you've got the CPL, right? Though the Zouks aren't doing great, either. 5th in the tournament, and you're not in the top 5 scorers. You're not even the top scorer in the Zouks.

“

How am I? I'm doing quite well, thanks. Don't know if you heard about it, but England just won the Ashes under my supervision. That's twice as captain, both home and away (I was the first captain to win an away Ashes since Gatting in '86, but you remember that, you were there); and now I've won AGAIN, this time as Director of Cricket for England.

”

Remember back in May when you said you deserved a place in the national team? You scored a triple century, not out, at the Oval? (shame we lost the last test match there, but what matters is we won the Ashes, eh?) Those were the good old days, weren't they? Everyone HAD to have an interview with you. And look at you now. New book coming out later this year and not a high profile interview to your name. 

If you find yourself a bit jobless, give me a call. I'll interview you; nice interview for the position of consultant to the England team for the Ashes ODIs. No guarantee I'll give you the job, but at least I'll interview you.

(By the way, as one South African to another, the Proteas team is pretty full, and they're doing okay as well, right now. You probably wouldn't have any luck getting in there either.)

Good talking to you KP. Nice to put all that petty stuff behind us, eh?