Samurai Japan stepped into a new era on Thursday night, and one of the team's future stars helped make it a winning start.

Shota Morishita broke a scoreless tie with a solo home run in the seventh inning, and Japan went on to earn a 4-0 win over Taiwan in its first game in the Asia Professional Baseball Championship at Tokyo Dome on Thursday night.

“We got the first run on the home run by Morishita and that helped get us started and we began to get hits and we scored some runs,” Japan manager Hirokazu Ibata said. “Overall, I think we had a good performance. I hope we can start (scoring runs) earlier tomorrow.”

Ibata was managing in his first official game since being hired as Japan manager in October. The former Chunichi Dragons star infielder has big shoes to fill in the role as he follows Hideki Kuriyama, who led Japan to the World Baseball Classic title this spring, and Atsunori Ibata, who guided Japan to the Olympic gold medal at the 2020 Summer Games.

Ibata's tenure got off to an inauspicious start as Taiwan starter Gu Lin Ruei-yang carried a perfect game into the sixth inning.

Gu Lin retired Shogo Sakakura to record his 16th consecutive out before Japan's Makoto Kadowaki doubled into the gap in center.

Yuji Akahoshi got the start for Japan and did his part to keep the game scoreless.

“I just wanted to continue to keep them off the scoreboard,” Akahoshi said.

Kaito Kozono singled to start the seventh but was later thrown out attempting to steal second. Morishita followed with a homer to left to give Japan a 1-0 lead.

“We had a runner caught stealing, and then right after that was a home run,” Ibata said. “He (Morishita) changed the atmosphere.”

The contest remained 1-0 until Japan added an insurance run on an RBI groundout by Chusei Mannami, who beat a throw to first to avoid an inning-ending double play, in the ninth. Shogo Sakakura and Kadowaki each followed with an RBI single to make the score 4-0.

Morishita has had an eventful month since the end of his first NPB regular season with the Hanshin Tigers.

He was named one of the outstanding players of this year’s Japan Series after setting a rookie record with seven RBIs to help the Tigers end a 38-year title drought.

He finished with two hits against Taiwan, adding a ninth-inning single to his home run.

Kadowaki was 3-for-4 with an RBI. Japan finished with 10 hits overall, with five coming in the ninth inning.

Japan pitcher Haruka Nemoto earned the win for Japan in relief.

Japan will face South Korea in its second game of the tournament on Friday night. South Korea won its game against Australia on a 10th-inning walk-off single earlier Thursday.

“The Korean team was struggling, but they won in the end,” Ibata said. “So I think they will take a different approach. We don’t want to be caught off guard by that. We want to play aggressively from the start.”