Next Saturday night, August 5th, Vasyl Lomachenko (8-1, 6 KOs) will defend the WBO super featherweight title against Miguel Marriaga (25-2, 21 KOs), who is moving up from the featherweight limit.

The ESPN televised fight takes place at the Microsoft Theater in Los Angeles, California.

Marriaga is really in tough. He is coming off an April twelve round decision loss to WBO featherweight champion Oscar Valdez, who has far less experience when compared to Lomachenko.

Marriaga's other defeat came at the hands of Nicholas Walters, who last year was easily defeated by Lomachenko. In fact, the two-time Olympic gold medal winner dominated him so badly that Walters quit.

According to Top Rank Vice President Carl Moretti, they were having a very difficult time securing a top opponent for Lomachenko - and Marriaga was one of the few who was available and willing to step up to the plate.

"Lomachenko is rightly considered one of the best fighters in the world. I think personally that he has the best footwork in the world. He’s just like a magician in there on his feet. This fight sort of came together, we were looking and a lot of the other 130 pound fighters either didn’t want the fight or were fighting other fights. Miguel Marriaga, who just lost a close decision to Oscar Valdez, was willing to step up and challenge Lomachenko at 130, in Los Angeles," Moretti told On The Ropes Boxing Radio.

"I think people are starting to catch on as to how good of fighter Lomachenko is, and it’s another chance for him to show his talent to even a wider audience on ESPN, and hopefully more people will just realize and see first-hand for themselves how good he is."

The original opponent that Top Rank pursued for Lomachenko was former champion Orlando Salido, who handed the Ukrainian fighter his first career defeat in 2014 - which was Lomachenko's second pro fight. They couldn't finalize the fight and Marriaga was brought in.

Top Rank would still be very interested in making that fight - but it would have to happen soon as Lomachenko is already looking at making the jump to the lightweight division.

"[Lomachenko] would like to do it. We thought all along that this was going to be the opponent for Vasyl on August the 5th and it just for whatever reason didn’t happen, so I don’t think that Lomachenko is going to worry about it moving forward. He is in a different stage of his career than Salido is. We would love to do it eventually or soon as possible, if it happens great, if it doesn’t, then so be it. You know those three words; life goes on," Moretti said.