France's cockerel depressed over double life

France's World Cup mascot, the cockerel Diomede, is to be sent home to his hens at a chicken farm near Brisbane, having been diagnosed as suffering from depression.

The fed-up fowl was instantly rumbled by the Fijians before France had even played a match as not being a genuine French bird, and now the strain of his double life appears to have caught up with him. He will leave the squad before France meet Japan in Townsville on Saturday.

France's hooker Raphael Ibanez revealed Diomede's plight yesterday. "Patrick Tabacco [the flanker], who has been in charge of Diomede and knows a lot about roosters because he grew up on a farm, sounded the alarm," Ibanez said. "He told us that Diomede was looking rather depressed so we decided that we couldn't decently take him to Townsville on Friday."

Despite the allegations about his Australian identity, Diomede had bravely run along the touchline at all France's training sessions. Claims that it is the French players, not Diomede, who are depressed because the player who made the worst mistake in practice had to clean out his cage, were dismissed yesterday.