Les flics came for Rémy Di Grégorio on the first rest day of the 2012 Tour de France, dragging him off to the Bastille on suspicion of using products other than baguettes and mineral water to fuel his race around France. Zut alors! Say it is not so!

His team, Cofidis, as you may recall, is all too familiar with this sort of thing. David Millar and Phillipe Gaumont in 2004; Cristian Moreni in 2007; the party never stops. Each time the team trots out the old zero-tolerance twaddle. Same shit, different day.

Come to think of it, Bradley Wiggins — presently wearing the maillot jaune in the Tour de France — was among the Cofidis riders who went home after stage 16 in 2007. I don’t suppose any of the cunts or wankers in the press corps will wish to shake off their bone-idleness, get off their arses and apply themselves to discussing those dark days with him.

Speaking of which, Sean Kelly, a man with his own flair for language — whatever language it is that he’s speaking — thinks that Wiggo’s press-conference tirade is an indicator that while he may be strong in the legs, he’s weak between the ears.

“Bradley has always been fragile,” Kelly told Cyclingnews.com. “A puncture or another upsetting incident can make him lose his head. Last year, (Cadel) Evans experienced some mechanical problems behind (Alberto) Contador, in the stage to L’Alpe d’Huez, and if it had been Wiggins, he would have panicked. But to win the Tour, you have to know how to stay calm, overcome adversity, whatever it may be — and that, I’m not sure he’s able to do.”