The Sky Blues took a surprising lead when Brandon O'Neill burst through thanks to Anthony Caceres and tucked a cheeky left-footed finish past the sprawling keeper.

Shanghai hit back quickly after half-time through Elkeson and Wang Shenchao, but ultimately Adam le Fondre restored a deserved parity with a bullet header to make it 2-2 and leave the sides even after two meetings, with a whopping five goals apiece. 

"We're disappointed to get the draw, we were pushing to get the win - we were in the ascendency," Le Fondre said.

"It shows the squad's resilience to come back from two goals and we deserved the win in the end. We can obviously focus on our games but it's good that the other games have sort of gone our way. 

"Huge game against Ulsan coming up."

Sydney sit last in their group and it will be a very tough match against Ulsan Hyundai away to come, with an A-League semi-final set to come five days before.

But with three points out of four matches, sitting only two points behind Shanghai in second, this group promises to go down to the wire.