AMERICAN cage fighter Chris ‘The Crippler’ Leben will compete in the UK for the first time in October.

And he is promising another first – to beat Clitheroe’s Michael Bisping on his home turf.

Bisping, whose mixed martial arts record is 17-1, has been a rising star in Ultimate Fighting Championship since winning reality TV show The Ultimate Fighter in 2006.

But Leben, a contender on the first season of the show, is considered by many to be the Brit’s first serious threat since he moved to the middleweight division earlier this year.

Speaking from his home in Hawaii, Leben said: “Bisping is really hyped up now and thinks he is the next great thing - but I think I am the next great thing.

“Right now my mission in life is to go to England and to beat Michael Bisping.”

Leben, 28, and 'The Count', 29, will square up at UFC 89 on October 18 in front of 10,500 fans at The National Indoor Arena, Birmingham.

The event, headlined by the pair, sold over 6,000 tickets in one week, which has been attributed to Bisping’s popularity.

But the American, who is head coach at Icon Fitness MMA gym, says he won’t be intimidated by the crowd’s support for the hometown favourite - or by Bisping himself.

“I realise I’m going to get a lot of boos but I tune the crowd out,” Leben said. “My job, as a fighter, is to beat the guy on the other side of the cage. There may as well be a black curtain around the cage for how much I’m aware of anything outside it.”

And the fighter, whose record stands at 18-4 with 10 wins by Knockout, laughed off comments made by Bisping last week that he would KO the American.

Leben, who has only been knocked out once (by reigning middleweight champion Anderson Silva), said: “I don’t care about what he says.

“Every single person has said they are going to knock me out. He is going to try and knock me out - and if he does then that’s good for him - but I doubt it will happen.

“I’m not going to say that I will knock him out, or submit him, or beat him in the first, second, or third round, but I will give him the absolute best fight I can and the better man will get their wrist raised at the end.

“And that will be me.”

Leben was first scheduled to fight Bisping at London’s 02 Arena on June 7 but the fight was postponed when Leben was jailed for a probation violation stemming from an earlier Driving Under the Influence arrest.

He said: “I was really upset when I realised I wasn’t going to be able to fight in June but now I have got a second chance.

“I’m really excited about this opportunity and that this fight is going to happen now. And I am excited about going to the UK and visiting England for the first time to fight.

“Bisping is obviously a great athlete and he had an awesome last fight. But I am better.

“We have similar styles and personalities and we are now colliding to see who will be at the elite level of the middleweight division.

“I have already been training hard for the last month and it will be my wrist raised at the end of the fight.”