Last season's Johnny Warren medallist put in a man of the match performance in the grand final rematch before 24,804 at Etihad Stadium.

After a goalless first half the Sky Blues took the lead on 53 minutes courtesy of an own goal to get their title defence off to a perfect start.

The always-composed Serbian told Fox Sports post-match: “It was very hard, especially against Melbourne, for the first game of the season to be a derby.

“We got three points and that’s most important. First half we were that little bit sloppy, after 10 we played our game, we scored and after that we started to play, I don’t want to say bad, but it was very hard.

“It was a similar game to the grand final, Melbourne is very good, they have very good players and it was very tough.

“To be honest, it’s going to be hard to reprise last year. But we’re going to better than last year."

In the second-half Luke Wilkshire's cross somehow evaded the head of Sky Blues captain Alex Brosque but not the boot of Thomas Deng who passed it into the back of the net.

Victory, missing three key players to Socceroos duty, dominated thereafter, with some good chances falling to Besart Berisha, but too often the final delivery fell short of what was needed.

But Ninkovic held firm to his conviction that Sydney could become the first A-League side to win back-to-back premierships. 

“It’s going to be very hard, (we won) 66 points and only lost one game, but because we won all these trophies it will be better, because we kept most of our players and we know each other better.”

The harboursiders are next in action on Wednesday when they face South Melbourne in the semi-final of the FFA Cup.