Queens Park Rangers manager Mark Warburton discusses their upcoming games with Barnsley and Charlton and his hopes for the rest of the season.

Brent & Kilburn Times: Queens Park Rangers' Grant Hall. Picture: Dave Howarth/PAQueens Park Rangers' Grant Hall. Picture: Dave Howarth/PA (Image: PA Wire/PA Images)

Queens Park Rangers boss Mark Warburton has challenged his side to play to the best of their ability in the final nine games of the Championship season.

Rangers extended their unbeaten run to six games on Saturday with a 3-1 win at Preston, scoring twice in the second half after going down to ten men when Geoff Cameron was sent off.

They now face two sides fighting to retain their Championship status in Barnsley on Saturday at the Kiyan Prince Foundation Stadium followed by Charlton Athletic at The Valley on Tuesday.

And Warburton has urged his team to keep up their recent run of form heading into the end of the season.

'The three massive points against Preston takes us to 50 now,' he told qpr.co.uk.

'That will be the watershed mark for any team in this division. We've got nine games to go, so let's see how good we can be in those nine games.

'The players have shown how good they can be. They understand the need for belief and desire.

'But we can't be patchy. You have to be consistent in your key principles.

'We have dropped silly points as a team this year, but we're learning and we're getting better.

'To come to Preston and deliver that second-half performance tells me we're definitely making strides in the right direction.'

The win against sixth-placed Preston leaves the R's just six points off them in the final play-off spot.

They face a Barnsley side who are bottom of the league and have lost their last two games against Cardiff City and Reading.

But when the two sides met earlier this season it was the Tykes who secured all three points, beating the R's 5-3 at Oakwell.

Despite struggling this season, Barnsley striker Cauley Woodrow has found the net 14 times in the league, while Conor Chaplin has scored 10 times.

Charlton, meanwhile, find themselves third from bottom and have lost their last three games, including a 1-0 defeat to Middlesbrough on Saturday.

A last-minute Naby Sarr equaliser in December ensured the points were split in a 2-2 draw when the sides last met.

Matt Smith, who spent the first half of the season on loan at QPR, could come up against his former side, as could Tomer Hemed.