Eastleigh's reward for a stunning 5-1 win over Boreham Wood is a lucrative FA Cup second round home tie against League 1 strugglers Reading.

The match over the weekend December 1-3 should attract a bumper crowd to the Silverlake Stadium - and be a potential candidate for live screening on terrestrial television.

The actual date and kick off time for the tie will be announced in due course, writes Mike Vimpany.

Managed by former Saints boss Ruben Selles, Reading are rock bottom of League 1, with only three wins. Their 3-2 cup victory over MK Dons was only their second win in nine matches.

Reading's early December visit will be the first time the Spitfires have played league opposition since MD Dons beat them in a penalty shoot-out (after a goalless draw) in the Covid 2020 cup season.

Chris Maguire was the inspiration behind Eastleigh's 5-1 thrashing of National League rivals Boreham Wood, scoring twice and laying on the other three Spitfires' goals. The win was worth £41,000 in sponsor's prize money.

The former Sunderland midfielder pulled the strings as dominant Eastleigh - knocked out of the cup by Boreham Wood in each of the past two seasons - blasted their way into the second round for the first time since 2016. 

Spitfires played the last 20 minutes or so with ten men after Jayden Harris was sent off for a second bookable offence and will miss Saturday's visit to Oldham Athletic.

Star man Maguire, who scored Eastleigh's second and fifth goals, said: "It was important we made up for the way we played at Maidenhead, but got in front early on which is what we needed to do.

"We allowed Boreham Wood to equalise very quickly, but once we restored our lead we dominated the game and played the way we wanted to.

"Our balance was right and the work rate all across the team spot on. Our finishing was clinical."

Eastleigh took the lead in the 15th minute, Chris Bush fouling Maguire on the far right. Boreham Wood failed to deal with the Scotsman's free kick and Nigel Atangana drilled a partial clearance past goalkeeper Nathan Ashmore.

Boreham Wood, eager to emulate their cup exploits of three seasons ago when they reached the fifth round at Everton, were level within 90 seconds, Matt Robinson equalising with a crisp shot on the turn after being set up by Erico Sousa.

Eastleigh restored their lead four minutes later - Enzio Boldewijn and Jake Taylor working the ball to the right by-line and Maguire rifling his shot past Ashmore to make it 2-1.

Joe McDonnell make a superb save to deny Tyronne Marsh before Boreham Wood were undone by another cross from a needlessly conceded free kick.

Cue Maguire to pick out Scott Quigley at the near post and glance a header to Ludwig Francillette to make it 3-1 at half-time.

Eight minutes into the second half Boreham Wood's cup dreams were effectively over. The inspirational Maguire sent another cross into the visitors' goalmouth and former Crawley Town man Francillette buried a header into the roof of the net.

Harris, Bailey Clements and Maguire all went close before Harris took an early bath for a second yellow card.

But Eastleigh scored a fifth when Maguire, full of confidence, seized on to a flick-on by Quigley and lured Ashmore out of his goal before dumping Boreham defenders on their backsides to round off a superb individual performance with the Spitfires' fifth.