Former UFC light heavyweight champion Mauricio Rua, also known by his nickname Shogun Rua, believes he’s close to a title fight and wants it against UFC heavyweight and light heavyweight champion Daniel Cormier.

The former UFC light heavyweight champ is slated to fight Anthony Smith at the upcoming UFC Hamburg event.

UFC Hamburg is set to take place on July 22, 2018, at Barclaycard Arena in Hamburg, Germany. The main card will air on FOX Sports 1 while the preliminary card will be split broadcasted on FOX Sports 1 and the promotion’s streaming service, UFC Fight Pass.

Cormier is coming off a big win in the main event of the UFC 226 pay-per-view event at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada when he was able to score a KO win over Stipe Miocic to win the UFC heavyweight title, which marks history as Cormier is now a two-division champion.

Former UFC heavyweight champion and current WWE universal champion Brock Lesnar made an appearance at this event and made it clear what his intentions were.

Then, things got out of hand. Cormier invited Lesnar inside the Octagon with Lesnar accepting the invitation and shoving Cormier in the process.

”I think Cormier is a great athlete, a complete fighter,” Rua told MMA Fighting. “Winning this fight I absolutely deserve this chance because of my history and my career in MMA.”

”It’s tough because he’s well-rounded, is good standing and on the ground, has one of the best wrestling in the UFC,” Rua said. “It’s tough because you have to train everything for him. It’s a big challenge, but you become a target when you have the belt because that’s what everyone dreams with.

“But I’m actually not thinking about the belt now because I have a good opponent ahead of me and I can’t think about it. The belt is my dream, of course, but I have to go step by step. I know that I will be closer if I win this fight.”

Cormier has made it clear that he wants to hang up his gloves by March 20th, 2019, the day he turns 40 years old. Thus, the reason he believes that he can only accept two fights before then.

He has gone on record by stating that he wants to fight Lesnar, which appears to be in the works, as well as trilogy fight against Jon Jones.