The hype surrounding Saturday’s meeting of Manchester City and Chelsea, the richest clubs in the Barclays Premier League, must have been galling to Queens Park Rangers, whose directors’ estimated collective wealth puts them second only to City in English football’s rich list. But if they want to get into the same league table as well, they will have to perform more convincingly than they did yesterday, even though the score suggests that they moved up to fourth place in the Coca-Cola Championship table with ease.

A goal up against ten men, Rangers allowed a feisty Southampton team to draw level before a double substitution turned the game back in their favour. “It was a great performance in terms of our attacking threat, but, out of possession, we were poor,” Iain Dowie, the Rangers manager, said.

Dexter Blackstock gave QPR the lead against his former club, after only 37 seconds, when Southampton failed to clear a long throw and it got worse for the visiting team when Oliver Lancashire was sent off on debut for a reckless tackle on Damien Delaney.

But Southampton stuck to their task, helped by a masterclass in shot-stopping by Kelvin Davis, the goalkeeper, who repelled Delaney’s effort from 20 yards out, a diving header by Blackstock and a close-range flick from the same player. Southampton got their reward seven minutes after the break, when Adam Lallana rolled the ball past Radek Cerny.

But, after 59 minutes, Dowie sent on Martin Rowlands and Patrick Agyemang and, two minutes later, Rowlands bent in a free kick for Damion Stewart, who was a yard offside when the ball was struck, to score. Southampton’s resistance ended 15 minutes later, when Blackstock scored after Davis had blocked Agyemang’s shot. Agyemang then went past tiring defenders to crack home a fourth in the final seconds.

“I’m proud of the boys,” Jan Poortvliet, the Southampton head coach, said. “They never gave up, but the second goal killed us mentally. It was offside and the boys didn’t deserve it.”

Queens Park Rangers (4-2-3-1): R Cerny – P Ramage, M Connolly, D Stewart, D Delaney – M Leigertwood, G Mahon – H Ephraim (sub: P Agyemang, 59min), M Parejo (sub: M Rowlands 59), L Cook – D Blackstock. Substitutes not used: L Camp, K Gorkss, A Balanta. Booked: Leigertwood, Delaney.

Southampton (4-5-1): K Davis – L James, O Lancashire, J Cork, A Surman – A Lallana, M Schneiderlin (sub: T Pekhart, 69), P Wotton, S Gillett, L Holmes (sub: N Dyer 22) – D McGoldrick. Substitutes not used: B Bialkowski, C Perry, S John. Booked: Schneiderlin, Dyer. Sent off: Lancashire.

Referee: K Friend. Attendance: 13,770.