Surging welterweight contender Kamaru Usman opens up about being ready to compete at UFC 228 and the struggles of finding opponents as he continues to chase championship gold.

As soon as it was announced that Tyron Woodley would defend the welterweight title against Darren Till at UFC 228 on Sept. 8 in Dallas, Texas, Kamaru Usman decided he was going to start training with an eye towards competing that evening.

No one contacted him.

No one asked him to be ready just in case.

No one told him that he was the first choice should one of the two competitors scheduled to hit the cage that night at American Airlines Arena be forced out of the contest.

He just decided it was something he was going to do because he’s always felt like this was the way he was going to end up claiming UFC gold and the fact that it was happening in his hometown only made it sweeter.

“It wasn’t really something that was contractual or anything like that,” said Usman, who tweeted out a message about winning the welterweight title at UFC 228 on Thursday. “When the fight was announced, I was training for the fight. I was like, ‘Okay, September 8th, I’m going to be fighting.’

“Obviously, with time, it got to the point where my management was starting to talk with the UFC about possibly doing something like that – get ready as a backup,” he added, alluding to the report by ESPN’s Brett Okamoto about the surging contender officially being on standby should anything go sideways during Fight Week in Dallas. “But there was no doubt in my mind when that fight was announced – I’m from Dallas; that’s my hometown – and I always thought this is how I would win the title. There would be some kind of controversy; someone would fall out or something like that and that’s how I would get the title.

“There was no doubt in my mind that I was going to make weight (for that fight). Whether the UFC wanted to have me as a backup or not, I was going to train and diet and prepare for that fight, regardless of whether I fight or not.”

The trouble for Usman is that if he doesn’t end up being tagged in to face either Woodley or Till early next month in Dallas, there aren’t exactly a ton of available names or top-ranked talents raising their hand, requesting the opportunity to share the cage with the suffocating grappler.

After emerging as the breakout star and tournament winner on Season 21 of The Ultimate Fighter, the 31-year-old has added another seven consecutive victories to his resume, pushing his record in the Octagon to 8-0 and his overall winning streak to an even dozen.

He’s the only man to beat ascendant British contender Leon Edwards in the last three years and he’s already picked up a pair of victories thus far in 2018 by outworking Emil Meek and Demian Maia in January and May respectively. He wants to fight twice more before the year is out – in September and December, ideally, barring injury – but knows finding a suitable opponent isn’t going to be easy.

“I’ve had conversations with my management, but also with the UFC heads, where they have confirmed, ‘You’re not the easiest guy to get fights for’ because at the end of the day, all they can do is offer the fight to guys and if the guys decide they don’t want to fight, where do you go from there?” he asked.

“It was hard in the beginning starting out and it’s even harder now because guys are trying to protect their ranking. I was offered the Colby Covington fight on November 30th in Las Vegas, Nevada and that seemed like a fight they were going to try to push really hard to get done, but in recent weeks, I guess that’s something that absolutely he’s not interested in, so it’s back to Square One once again.”

It’s a problem numerous ambitious and upwardly mobile talents have been running into over the last 18 months.

Next weekend’s headliner James Vick has been pleading for a chance to face a Top 10 opponent for the last year and only managed to land opposite Justin Gaethje after Al Iaquinta removed his name from consideration for the main event contest in Lincoln, Nebraska.

“… at the end of the day, all they can do is offer the fight to guys and if the guys decide they don’t want to fight, where do you go from there?”

After earning stoppage victories in each of his four bouts since returning to the lightweight division last summer, New Zealander Dan Hooker can’t find anyone in the Top 10 willing to sign on the dotted line to face him later this year and has reached the point that he’s ready to face anyone who thinks they can give him a good fight.

Usman has been in that position before and made the same decision “The Hangman” seems resigned to making in order to stay active and try to force his way into the title conversation, but it’s not something he’s willing to do this time around; not when he’s this close to making his championship dreams come true.

“For a while, it was, ‘Okay, let me get a fight. I need a fight. I want to compete,’ but if that’s not pushing me towards that goal of being ‘King of the Hill,’ then I might as well look for something else,” he said. “For a while, I was the only one doing that in the Top 15 of the division.

“I fought Emil Meek when I was in the Top 10, Top 15 and he has one fight in the UFC, just because he was the only guy that was willing to step up. I fought Sergio Moraes – I’m in the Top 15, he’s not even ranked and he’s a very tough opponent, but I still took that chance.

“I’ve been the guy who has consistently taken that chance of fighting those guys and right now, it feels like it’s time for me to get those marquee fights that get me to my goal of being the champion. If not, maybe I should look for something else.”

While he very much hopes to be stepping into the Octagon on Saturday, September 8 in Dallas, Usman plans on being in attendance to watch how things play out between Woodley and Till should everything go off without a hitch next month.

After all, it’s going down in his hometown and he’s not going to miss out on an opportunity to visit friends and family and get an up-close view of the action as Woodley and Till battle for the welterweight title.

“… right now, it feels like it’s time for me to get those marquee fights that get me to my goal of being the champion.”

And whether it happens in four weeks or somewhere further down the road, “The Nigerian Nightmare” likes his chances against both halves of the UFC 228 championship main event, which means it’s only a matter of time before he makes his dream of winning the UFC welterweight title a reality.

“Both are super-tough guys and both very good guys,” he said, offering up the standard acknowledgements of what his 170-pound colleagues bring to the table. “With Tyron, we know he’s very well rounded, but I believe I’m better. I do everything he does and I do it better than he does, so it’s going to have to be who is smarter on that night.

“With Darren Till – Darren is a great big guy, great competitor, but at the end of the day, everybody wants to know, ‘Can you grapple?’ and everybody knows that I am the best at doing that in the division.

“But I’ll be there; that’s my hometown,” he added. “It gives me an opportunity to go see my family and at the end of the day, I will have at least 50 Nigerians coming to the event just because I’m associated with it in some way.

“It would be a blessing to become champion in front of all of them, but if not, I’ll still be there to watch that event.”