A comedian has won £5000 in a Twitter competition for a Miley Cyrus joke that links the singer to Christmas dinner.

Richard Woolford won $5000 in the online competition run by TV channel Gold to find the best Christmas cracker joke.

His winning entry is: "What does Miley Cyrus have at Christmas? Twerky." The gag makes reference to the singer's now infamous performance with Robin Thicke at this year's MTV VMAs which led to her subsequently clashing with Sinead O'Connor after the Irish singer warned her not to let the music industry "prostitute" her.

As The Guardian reports, Woolfood has recently returned to the stand up circuit after battling cancer. "This has been a phenomenal year and a great welcome back into comedy for me," he said. "All I want to do is write comedy professionally, and hopefully this is another step closer to my dream."

Earlier today (December 10), it was revealed that Miley Cyrus has been named in the Top 10 of Time magazine's Person of the Year poll.

Other figures to appear on the shortlist include Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad, Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos, Texas Senator Ted Cruz, Pope Francis, Iranian president Hassan Rouhani, Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, NSA leaker Edward Snowden, gay rights activist Edith Windsor and 2012 winner, President Barack Obama.