It's not every day you get to meet an English World Cup winner. Here's Nobby Stiles looking mighty dapper at a charity do in Manchester.

Shrovetide Football in Ashbourne

The Royal Shrovetide Football Match takes place in Ashbourne, Derbyshire,  every Shrove Tuesday and Ash Wednesday . I went to photograph it on Tuesday . It's a bizarre mix of wrestling , football and rugby similar to the Haxey Hood I photographed recently. The games origins date back to at least the 12th century and some versions of its history suggest that the ball used for the game was originally a severed head tossed to the crowd after an execution. The game starts at 2pm and can go on until 10 at night . There are no boundaries to the game, resulting in the ball ending up in such diverse terrain as rivers , muddy fields and car parks. A glimpse of the ball is a rare thing as most of the time all you can see is a swaying , steaming , mass of men slowly moving around the town and fields. Every now and then the ball is greeted by cheers at is emerges into the air for a few brief seconds. There are few rules other than the main one that committing murder or manslaughter is prohibited!

Craig Revel Horwood and Lisa Riley pictured backstage at the Manchester Arena ahead of Strictly Come Dancing Live . Lisa is to star in to star in stage show Strictly Confidential later this year . The former Emmerdale actress will appear in the show directed and written by Strictly judge Craig Revel Horwood

Happy New Year ! The Chinese Year of the Snake is celebrated on the soggy streets of Manchester

A few pictures from a fantastic couple of weeks in Thailand . Spent most of my time either eating food from street vendors or photographing them and I became partial to the Thai concept of meat on a stick - like an ice lolly but with meat (nicer than it sounds!) . We travelled from Bangkok to the north of Thailand where we spent a couple of days trekking in the jungle led by our guide Mario who seemed to survive on no sleep and carried an old hunting rifle which he would periodically fire into the undergrowth . He never hit anything although I was expecting him to hit one of us at some point . We then travelled south to the island Koh Phangan which although famous for its full moon parties was beautifully peaceful .

                                         Koh Phangan

Picking clams at sunset on Koh Phangan island

A butcher at a market in Thong Sala , Koh Phangan

Preparing squid to be sold at market

North Thailand

Preparing dinner by torch light in a jungle village east of Chiang Mai , north Thailand

Bangkok

Christine Williams was aged 17 and just weeks from giving birth when she was sexually assaulted by Jimmy Savile in Salford in 1966.

read her story here - http://tinyurl.com/bx2jt77

The Weird and Wonderful Haxey Hood in Lincolnshire

Before driving over to the village of Haxey in Lincolnshire to photograph their annual game , The Haxey Hood ,  I did my research. I read about the cast of the Fool , the Boggins' and the Lord of the Hood and heard about the basic premise of the game - hundreds of men in a muddy field trying to guide the hood (a leather cylinder) towards their favourite pub in the village . Makes perfect sense right? I can confirm that the event was just as wonderfully surreal as it sounded .

The event , which dates back to the 14th century , starts shortly after noon when the officials of the Hood  tour the village pubs involved . The fool leads this procession of officials through the village up to the Parish Church where he makes a speech of welcome while a fire of damp straw is lit underneath him . Fortunately the fool survives the flames and is able to declare ; "Hoose agen hoose, toon agen toon, if a man meets a man knock 'im doon, but doan't 'ot 'im." For those in need of a translation that's; "House against house, town against town, if a man meets a man, knock him down but don’t hurt him."

After this it's off to the  fields just outside the village where the real action begins . After a few preliminary games for children  , the hood is launched into the air and the men of Haxey begin their epic battle . The game resembles a huge rugby scrum which lurches and strains through the mud while competitors try to guide the hood contained within the mass of people towards their favourite pub . The team of boggins is on hand to ensure nobody is too seriously injured when the scrum inevitably collapses every minute or so.   It's a truly bizarre sight and one that I can only imagine could be possible in rural England . 

After a mere three hours of action The Kings Arms proudly claimed victory .