Darren Bent, Footballer

I love football. I really do. So the call saying that I was off to do an exclusive shoot with Sunderland and England striker Darren Bent for The Times was a good one to receive.

It was the day after Fabio Capello announced the England squad to travel to the World Cup in South Africa, and despite hitting a bagful of goals again this season, Bent was once again left to book his own summer holiday. I met Darren at his mum's house in Cambridgeshire, where he received his disappointing fate- sitting on the same couch that he sat on four years ago to receive the same news from Sven Goran Eriksson.

Darren is well known as an avid user of twitter, tweeting his views regularly and sometimes in quite an outspoken way. He spent much of our time together (as I looked through the viewfinder awaiting his readiness) tweeting away on his Blackberry, but despite this he came across as a lovely bloke- one of football's good guys who deserves every success. Darren was surprisingly upbeat about his setback, eager to put it behind him and work harder for success next season.

Charity Shield at Wembley

I had the opportunity to photograph the Charity Shield at Wembley today- the inaugural curtain raiser to the football season which this year featured Manchester United and Portsmouth. The match ended 0-0 and United won on penalties.

I'd never been to the new Wembley before today, and was a humbling experience- an incredible stadium that looks enormous from pitch level. The photographer's entrance alone is bigger than most family homes.

Reading FC Training

This morning I went to photograph Reading FC training for their match against Newcastle this coming Saturday. As an avid watcher of football, I always find it interesting watching training sessions- seeing how the players perform in a less pressurised environment than a match.

Manager Steve Coppell.

Andre Bikey clashes with Emerse Fae.

Stephen Hunt.

Kevin Doyle.

Jerusalem Post

In early 2006 I experienced my first taste of professional press photography, self-organising an internship at prestigious daily The Jerusalem Post in Israel. As an aspiring photographer with absolutely no technical training or previous professional experience I was hopeful that during this four month internship, I would have a picture or two published.

Within a week I'd had three pictures published, and once they found out I was a sports fan, promptly made me their 'Chief Sports Photographer', otherwise known as their only sports photographer.


During my stint at the Jerusalem Post, I photographed two national football cup finals, European basketball, athletics and motor racing- alongside some non-sport features. It was a great experience, which taught me more about tenacity than any course could have done, and I would dearly love to live and work in Israel for a newspaper or an agency in the future- yes that is a hint if any Israeli newspaper editors or agency chiefs are reading!