It appears Anthony Johnson has finally taken it upon himself to control his own fortune in the UFC.
Following his two remarkable wins since returning to the promotion, which included a vicious KO over Antonio Rogerio Nogueira, Johnson made it clear that he is interested in a title shot and wants to face Alexander Gustafsson to get to that coveted spot.
‘Rumble' took to Facebook to call out the former title challenger:
"@AlexTheMauler I respect you as a fighter but this is business," Johnson wrote. "@danawhite said our fight makes sense. There's nobody left for us to fight plus the fans are begging for us to fight so let's give the fans what they wanna see!"
Gustafsson, who was scheduled to meet Jon Jones in a highly anticipated rematch at UFC 178 in Las Vegas, suffered a knee injury and was forced to surrender his No. 1 contender spot to undefeated former Olympian Daniel Cormier. Things only got more complicated when Jones withdrew from the bout entirely to undergo knee surgery, which put him out of action until 2015.
'The Mauler,' who was once guaranteed a title shot and a rematch against Jones, is now forced to await the fallout between Cormier-Jones at an unconfirmed date. This has led to a certain amount of pressure from UFC officials to book a match-up against Anthony Johnson to determine the No. 1 contender.
Time will tell whether the Swede will cave and accept the bout or simply sit out and await his opportunity as he had previously stated.