Japan coach Javier Aguirre challenged his players to maintain their intensity after they eased off in a 4-0 stroll over Palestine to begin their Asian Cup defence.
The four-time champions were too strong for the Palestinians, making their debut in the tournament, and never looked back once Yasuhito Endo gave them an eighth-minute lead.
Shinji Okazaki, Keisuke Honda and Maya Yoshida added further goals to make it 4-0 with 40 minutes remaining but the battling West Asians held firm to keep the score relatively respectful despite being reduced to 10 men.
With tougher Group D tasks against Iraq and Jordan to come, Mexican Aguirre wanted improvements.
"I was happy and satisfied with the defence, but I saw some points to improve on the attacking side," he told reporters after the win at Canberra Stadium.
"We will have two or three days of training and I'm expecting those points to improve through the training sessions.
"Because we won by four goals today, I don't want the players to lose their intensity so I will take care of that in the meeting with the players so we don't do that."
Striker Okazaki took his goal well to make it 2-0, stooping to deflect a powerful volleyed shot from Shinji Kagawa into the net, but the Germany-based striker was unhappy with his performance.
"I am glad I scored but I didn't create that many chances to shoot and I am not happy about that," Okazaki was quoted as saying by Kyodo News.
"It's my job to score so I have to get involved more in goalscoring chances."
The striker was replaced late on by Yohei Toyoda but is sure to retain his place in the starting line-up when the Blue Samurai face a tougher opposition in Iraq on Friday.
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