Melbourne Victory beat Shanghai SIPG in AFC Champions League

A penalty from leading scorer Besart Berisha gave Australian champions Melbourne Victory a 2-1 win over China's Shanghai SIPG in the AFC Champions League on Wednesday.

Victory remain unbeaten in their past seven home games in the ACL thanks to Berisha and a 31st-minute opener from newcomer Jai Ingham.

Albanian Berisha provided the pass to Kosta Barbarouses, who was brought down on the edge of the area by Lu Wenjun for Melbourne's spot kick in the 73rd minute.

Before the penalty the Chinese Super League team coached by Sven-Goran Eriksson equalised through Wu Lei in the 52nd minute, and also had a number of late chances.

Victory goalkeeper Danny Vukovic saved a Wu shot with his feet with six minutes of regulation time left, before the influential Argentine Dario Conca unleashed a thunderous volley that beat the flying Vukovic only to cannon off the post.

Shanghai SIPG paid 18.5 million euros ($20 million) to sign Brazilian striker Elkeson from Guangzhou Evergrande last month. Conca became the world's third-highest paid player, behind only Real Madrid's Cristiano Ronaldo and Barcelona's Lionel Messi, when he signed for Guangzhou Evergrande in 2011 before joining Shanghai SIPG a year ago.

Melbourne Victory, who won last year's A-League title but are struggling in fifth spot this season, have yet to move on from the group stage in four previous ACL campaigns.

Melbourne Victory will face Gamba Osaka in Japan next week, with Shanghai SIPG at home to South Korea's Suwon Samsung Bluewings in the next round in Group G.