BRYAN HUGHES hopes to progress in the play-offs without going to a penalty shoot-out but the Wrexham boss says his players are prepared if their clash with Eastleigh goes the distance.

Wrexham face the Spitfires at The Racecourse in their preliminary round tie with the winners advancing to a semi-final at Salford City on Sunday.

Any kind of win will keep the promotion dream alive and although Hughes hopes to progress inside 90 minutes or even after extra-time, he is preparing for all eventualities and says the players have been practicing penalties just in case.

"It is a cup game, it is a knockout," said Hughes. "Whether it goes to extra-time or penalties, it has got to be decided on the night.

"Whenever you get to the play-offs you need that little bit of luck as well; whether it comes tonight, whether it comes if we progress, hopefully we will get it this year.

"It comes down to fine margins. A lot of fine margins have happened in games over the current campaign, whether you win or lose, and hopefully we can show a little bit of quality on the night to get us over the line."

Wrexham were only awarded two penalties during the regular season, both in October, with Luke Summerfield and Brad Walker both converting spot-kicks away at Dagenham and Chesterfield respectively.

On the prospect of going to a shoot-out if the sides can't be separated after 120 minutes, Hughes added: "There's potential penalties at the end of it. That is one thing we haven't had a lot of this year.

"We have only had two so we have been working on penalties as well just in case; you have got to cover every aspect.

"Hopefully it won't get to that stage. No-one likes to get to the penalty shoot-out, even though it is great for the neutral.

"Being a part of it, it can be one of them times where the pressure can get the better of people and I don't want our campaign to finish on that.

"Personally I would rather we won outright with a bit of quality on the night."

The players are focused on Eastleigh but Hughes has had to look at the bigger picture.

“The total focus is on Eastleigh from a playing point of view,” said Hughes. “From the management side of things, we have got to have contingency plans in place; we can’t just drop everything if we get through and start planning for Salford.

“We have made a few contingency plans just in case but we are all focussed on our job in hand.”