My name is

Daniel Ogunshakin

Broadcast Journalist

Pleasure and Pain: suffering through Liverpool's title run in

22nd Apr 2014

It's been 24 long years since Liverpool last won the league title and with three games of the Premier League season remaining, Brendan Rodgers' side stands on the brink of immortality.
As a passionate Red, I have endured a long wait to see my team in such a heady position with so few games still to play, and I am thrilled at the prospect of seeing Steven Gerrard lift the Premier League trophy above his head on May 11.
But I have a confession to make... I'm not enjoying the run in all that much.
Actually, that's not true; I am thrilled to see Liverpool top of the league but the actual experience of watching the games themselves is proving torturous.
Unlike the players, there is nothing I can do to influence the outcome of matches so all I can do is support my team from Singapore, admittedly through my fingers and occasionally cowering behind the sofa.
Watching Liverpool has always been one of my favourite past times but it was considerably easier to do when the Reds weren't in contention; utterly disappointing, but far less nerve shredding.
Even Liverpool making the run to the Champions League final in 2005, the second leg against Chelsea aside, was less painful because of the seeming improbability of actually winning the tournament no matter how far we progressed.
The final itself seemed like a pressure off bonus, although the final minutes of extra time, especially when the ball fell to Andriy Shevchenko before Jerzy Dudek made 'that' save, were pretty nerve wracking.
The past two matches against Manchester City and Norwich have seen me race through a whole gamut of emotions: joy, ecstasy, fear, anxiety and ultimately back to joy, but I'm starting to wonder if my heart can take another three rollercoaster rides against Chelsea, Crystal Palace and Newcastle United.
A colleague joined me in watching the game against Norwich at Carrow Road and he decided it was more entertaining to watch me rather than the football, so traumatic and gut wrenching was the experience once the Canaries reduced the deficit.
I was on edge, drinking more quickly, swearing wholeheartedly and having kittens every time a Norwich cross went floating into the Liverpool box towards Simon Mignolet.
It'd be nice if the team could see the game out in a controlled manner but that's not the Liverpool way under Rodgers this season and there's no reason to believe it will change between now and May 11.
If they can make it tense, they undoubtedly will.
I was eight the last time Liverpool won the league and, although a fan, I wasn't particularly connected at that stage so this is my first time experiencing the tension of leading a title race going into the denouement of the season.
Does it get easier once the first one is in the bag?
Is it like playing, where once you have experience of successfully negotiating a title run in, it gets easier to do it again because you learn from your mistakes?
That said I'm not sure how I could have things differently.
Like Brendan Rodgers and his squad, I've adopted a one-game-at-a-time policy, trying not to get ahead of myself, and I've insisted that a top four finish and a place in the Champions League is the objective.
I've just about managed to keep myself grounded but now expectations are at an all time high it's hard not to get carried away.
Like everyone else connected with Liverpool around the world, I'm daring to dream and, in reality, I'll take torture like this every season if it means we're still in business come squeaky bum time.