Nigel Farage has admitted he would be "booted out" as Ukip leader if he does not win a seat in next year's election - but bullishly insisted he will not fail.
The Ukip leader said his party would "pick someone better" to take over from him if he cannot win in Thanet South after he was selected by local members to contest the seat.
The contest will see him pitched against another former Ukip leader, Craig MacKinlay, who has been selected by Conservatives to try to replace incumbent Laura Sandys who is standing down.
Asked if he would quit as leader if he fails in his bid to be Ukip's first MP, Mr Farage said told ITV: "In all of life if you succeed you get the laurels and the champagne and if you fail you get booted out. That applies to Ed Miliband, to David Cameron, to Nick Clegg and to me.
"If we fail next year the party will pick someone better than me," he said, before bullishly adding: "But we won't."
Mr Farage's optimism comes despite having previously won just 5 per cent of the vote as he came in fourth place after contesting the seat in 2005.
He said: "Ten years is a long time in politics - 10 years ago people did not see the Ukip message being relevant."
Local election results in May, when Ukip made storming gains around the country, saw the party top the poll with more than 16,000 votes - twice as many as second placed Tories.
But after being selected to contest the seat in next year's general election, Mr Farage last night warned against complacency.
"We can't for one moment afford to be complacent because we swept the board in 2013 and we swept the board here in 2014," he said.
"We did and that was magnificent. But don't think that the heavy artillery from the Conservative and Labour parties will not be fired on this constituency.
"They will, they will, they will try very, very hard. They don't want Ukip breaking through into Parliament and they most certainly do not want me breaking through into Parliament.
"Somebody said I'm David Cameron's worst nightmare. Well, that's not good enough. I want to be Ed Miliband's worst nightmare, too."
