The New Nation - Internet Edition

Times Online

Madonna has moved to end growing media speculation over the state of her marriage - and a rumoured love quadrangle - by denying she has had an affair or plans to divorce Guy Ritchie.

The usually media-shy singer released a statement yesterday after the wife of the American baseball star Alex Rodriguez accused her of ruining their marriage.

In an interview with The New York Post, Cynthia Rodriguez's lawyer, Maurice Kutner, said she will file for divorce today and would cite her husband's relationship with Madonna in legal papers.

Kutner said that the "relationship with Madonna was the latest situation in a series of events" that doomed the marriage.

But Madonna, who rarely gives interviews and has long refused to discuss her private life, took the unusual decision to issue a statement to the American celebrity magazine People denying she was romantically involved with the Yankees star.

"My husband and I are not planning on getting a divorce.

"I know Alex Rodriguez through Guy Oseary, who manages both of us. I brought my kids to a Yankee game. I am not romantically involved in any way with Alex Rodriguez."

Madonna went on to refute Cynthia Rodriguez's allegations that she had "brainwashed" Rodriguez and that his new interest in Madonna's favoured religion of Kabbalah had driven them apart. "I have nothing to do with the state of his marriage or what spiritual path he may choose to study." She also took a swipe at media: "I have learnt over the years not to take accusations and the many false reports about me very seriously. I also appreciate how fiction and fact seem to be perceived as one and the same by people who read both newspapers and the internet."