Mark Warburton has called for urgent defensive improvement from his QPR side in the wake of a ‘really frustrating’ defeat at Birmingham.

The Rs led 1-0 going into the final eight minutes at St Andrew’s but two late goals from the hosts turned the game on its head.

Kristian Pedersen’s header cancelled out Charlie Austin’s first-half opener before Alen Halilovic curled home from just outside the area to win the game for Blues.

Warburton felt both goals were avoidable and rued the sloppiness which saw his side drop to 17th in the Championship table.

“With 10 minutes to go, we didn’t really feel threatened – we had to defend intelligently and look after the football,” he said.

“However, we’ve given away three points.

“They threw on Lukas Jutkiewicz and have Marc Roberts as well. They are a big, physical team and we gave away a couple of cheap free-kicks.

“For the first goal, Rob Dickie won the ball but, in the second phase, we lost Pedersen.

“They are big guys but we’ve got to defend better than that. It was a really frustrating afternoon for us in the end.”

Austin’s fourth goal in nine games since returning to Loftus Road on loan had given Rangers a timely boost going into the interval and the visitors should have doubled their lead shortly after the break, only for Stefan Johansen to blaze over from six yards out.

In a game short of clear-cut chances, the miss proved costly in what Warburton described as ‘a horrible game to watch’.

“We managed to get ourselves in at half-time 1-0 up in what was a really scrappy game,” he said.

“The pitch was really poor and it was a difficult game for both teams.

“But, like I said, we got ourselves in front before half-time – it was a great cross from Todd Kane for Charlie to finish.

“Then we missed a golden chance just after half-time to finish the game off. We had more chances after that, too, and looked in total control until the final 10 minutes.”

QPR are back on home soil for the visit of Barnsley on Wednesday night in a match which will be preceded by a minute’s applause for former captain Glenn Roeder, who has died at the age of 65.

Roeder scored 18 goals in 181 appearances for QPR and Warburton said: “It is very sad.

“Glenn was held in such high regard by so many in the game – especially at QPR for his achievements here.

“I know he was battling illness for a long, long time. He’ll be missed by so many.”