Darren Till knew Donald Cerrone was a ‘broken man,’ ‘as soon as he stepped into the cage’

The UFC’s newest top ranked welterweight isn’t short on confidence.

Darren Till has now officially taken the welterweight division by storm. The 170lb weightclass is nearly 100 fighters deep in the world’s largest MMA promotion, but now riding a 4-0-1 record, Till finds himself ranked among the elite. And all it took was running through Donald Cerrone like Cerrone wasn’t even there.

Simple, right?

It is to hear Till tell it. The Liverpudlian made a recent appearance on the MMA Hour to talk about netting the biggest win of his career to date, and it sounds like the fight was never in doubt for a moment (transcript via MMA Fighting).

“As soon as he stepped into the cage on Saturday, I knew that he was a broken man,” Till told Ariel Helwani.

“I knew that he was mine. He was mine, he was in my world. My confidence is not fake, it’s 100 percent real and that’s what it is.”

“He just walked into the cage. He wasn’t the Cowboy that I had seen fight Robbie Lawler,” he continued.

“He wasn’t the Cowboy that I had seen fight all these years. He looked at me and he could just see a 24-year-old monster in front of him.

“He was trying to get hyped while he was in the cage. I could see him when I was walking around and I was just standing, looking and smiling with this confidence that I was going to take him out in a few minutes.

“I just knew, mate.”

Of course, part of that could be just how massive a welterweight Till is to take on. Till told Helwani he was walking around near 90kg on fight night, or 198lbs. That size and power may have played a big factor in the cage, as Cerrone appeared completely unable to push Till back, or hold him down on the canvas.

As for what’s next? Till has been teasing the idea of a fight with Stephen Thompson on social media. ‘Wonderboy’ is currently scheduled to meet Jorge Masvidal at UFC 217. Win or lose there, a win over the former title challenger is almost certainly something that would keep the new contender on the path to a UFC belt.