A Brazil fan enjoys the atmosphere prior to the 2014 FIFA World Cup Brazil Semi Final match between Brazil and Germany at Estadio Mineirao in Belo Horizonte, Brazil, on Jule 8, 2014. (Photo by Robert Cianflone/Getty Images)

Lebanese women smoke nargileh (water pipe) and watch a streaming broadcast of the FIFA World Cup 2022 group G soccer match between Brazil and Switzerland, at a café-restaurant in the area of Sabtiyeh, north of Beirut, on November 28, 2022. Lebanon being hit hard by the economic crisis, the country did not obtain the rights to broadcast the 2022 World Cup this year, depriving Lebanese fans of the World Cup. (Photo by Joseph Eid/AFP Photo)

In a simpler time all a child or an adult needed to enjoy the outdoors was a ball and a stick. Or maybe an old tire tied to a high branch to fashion a swing. And the only instruction given to children was to “be home before dark”. Now there are iPads and computers and television screens and shrinking safe public spaces. But despite the distractions and limitations of space, these images show the charm of kicking a ball or skipping rope endures. Sometimes with modifications as a nod to changing times. Here: in this Saturday, June 20, 2015 photo, a boy runs while playing with a motorcycle wheel in Samugari, Ayacucho, Peru. (Photo by Rodrigo Abd/AP Photo)

Dozens of crocodiles are seen in an inactive farm in the Jordan Valley near the Israeli Petzael settlement in the West Bank on January 18, 2021. Hundreds of crocodiles are stranded in a farm after an Israeli businessmen lost his business as Israel passed a law in 2012 defining the crocodile as a protected animal, and banning raising the animals for sale as meat or merchandise. (Photo by Menahem Kahana/AFP Photo)

This aerial photo taken on March 2, 2023 shows bulldozers working to build high-standard farmlands in Pucheng County, southeast China's Fujian Province. A new round of high-standard farmlands building is underway in Pucheng County in preparation of spring ploughing. (Photo by Xinhua News Agency/Rex Features/Shutterstock)

Honourable mention, Behaviour category. Toss the scorpion – Indian roller playing with its kill by Susmita Datta. The image was taken during an early morning safari drive at Tadoba Andhari Tiger Reserve in India. (Photo by Susmita Datta/PA Wire/Royal Society Publishing Photography Competition 2017)

A cat sits in front of a retro car owned by retired mechanic Mikhail Krasinets at an open-air museum of Soviet-era vehicles in the village of Chernousovo, Tula region, Russia on September 27, 2018. In the remote village of Chernousovo, retired mechanic Mikhail Krasinets tends to more than 300 ramshackle, Soviet-era cars, remnants of a once vibrant auto industry that crumbled with the fall of the Soviet Union. (Photo by Maxim Shemetov/Reuters)

Highly commended, mammals: Gelada after the storm – Marco Gaiotti (Italy). “Gelada baboons are the only monkey species in the world that feed on grasses. They are native to the tableland of Ethiopia. Every morning large family groups wander from their sleeping places in the steep rock face, up to 1,000 metres high, to the feeding grounds at the tablelands. This image clearly depicts their feeding strategy: they pull out bunches of grass, sort the stalks and then lift them to their mouth. This shot was taken towards the end of the rainy season after a heavy storm”. (Photo by Marco Gaiotti/2019 GDT European Wildlife Photographer of the Year)