Belfast Giants coach Dave Whistle criticised his players' commitment after they went down to the Scottish Eagles at the Belfast Odyssey Arena on Wednesday night.

The disappointing result was only a second home Superleague defeat in two years for the Giants.

Whistle will now be looking for a lot more from his players when they travel to London and Bracknell in the next two weekends

The Giants were four goals down before they started playing, but all they could manage was two consolation efforts in the last four minutes.

"The commitment wasn't there and I am very disappointed at the way we came out," said a glum Whistle.

"We work hard on coming out of the gate flying and we need the effort that was there in the last five minutes to come in the first five minutes to get us going and to get the crowd going.

"We didn�t give the crowd anything to cheer about until the last five minutes and there was no level of intensity from us at all in the 60 minutes.

"The shot count says we had 41, but I don't think that is a true reflection because they weren't good shots.

"There was a lack of effort and we aren't getting effort from the full team for 60 minutes and the scorers have to start scoring."

The Eagles went ahead through Johan Astrom on 16 minutes, though goalie Ryan Bach felt he had been impeded.

Too late

They doubled their lead five minutes into the second period through Jeff Williams and their captain Sean Selmser killed the game as a contest with the third on 34 minutes.

Jason Rushton notched the fourth six minutes into the third period to compound a miserable night for Bach in the home side's goal.

Rod Stevens scored for the home side three minutes from time - his 51st goal in 100 matches for Whistle's side.

And David Matsos brought a degree of respectability to the scoreline with the home team's second a minute later, but it was too little too late from the Giants.