Northern Ireland face Serbia in Belfast on Friday night and Aaron Hughes has stressed the importance of securing a win to keep his side’s Euro 2012 dream alive. Both Hughes and Chris Baird look set to take part in the encounter.
"It's impossible to stress the importance because a win would put us in a superb position,” said Hughes.
Nigel Worthington’s side currently sit third in Group C, behind leaders Italy and Slovenia who are in second place. Crucially, Northern Ireland have a game in hand over Slovenia and sit only two points off second spot.
"There is a feel-good factor in the squad, an excitement, anticipation about the game. In the last two campaigns we missed out but I reckon we've learned a lesson and eradicated mistakes," said Hughes.
"We're coming off the back of a good win against the Faroes and that's important because we're getting to the latter stages of the campaign now.
"There's less room for error so a win for us over Serbia now would really put us in an excellent position.
"Hopefully we've learned from those and we can overcome any little mistakes we made. I don't think there's a particular reason for why we missed out last time but we lost games at crucial times.
"In the latter stages of the campaign there's less room for error because there isn't the time to recover."
Hughes will also be hoping that qualification for the 2012 European Championships will give him a long awaited major tournament debut.
“It has crossed my mind that time is against me if I want to play in the finals of a major tournament, but then as you get older you start thinking like that,” said Hughes.
“When you’re younger you think you’ve got all the time in the world, but as you get older you start to appreciated that the chances are starting to run out.
“We’re in a good position, but Serbia and Slovenia will thinking the same thing.”