While it is common to see strikers with good conversion rates compete among each other to make it into the playing eleven, it is certainly unusual and rare for a defender to stay in contention with a striker to become the top scorer. 

Although rare, such is the case for the Bangladesh football team. Many a time it comes down to a strike from centre-back Tapu Barman or goals from striker Mahabur Rahman Sufil coming off the bench in order to secure a victory or a last-minute draw for Bangladesh.

During the SAFF Championship opener on Friday, Tapu converted a penalty to give Bangladesh a winning start in the tournament. With that goal, he also joined Sufil in the race for being the top scorer with both the players now equal at five goals each for the national side.

Who will score goals for Bangladesh? This simple question was raised yet again before the start of the ongoing SAFF Championship and Bangladesh interim coach Oscar Bruzon's reply to the journalists' inquiry time and again in Maldives have been that every one of his squad can score goals.

Ahead of today's crucial match against India, the focus will be on Tapu and Sufil though there are some other players in the squad who also have some goals in their ranks.

Biplu Ahmed is the second-highest scorer with three goals followed by Matin Mia's two. Ibrahim and Saad Uddin have one goal each while promising forward Suman Reza has two goals against Kyrgyzstan U-23 side in his belt.

During training, centre-back Tapu appeared more hungrier to score goals despite not being a forward and inquired about the highest scorer of Bangladesh in SAFF Championship. This reporter joked with Tapu whether he wanted to play in the number nine position at the club levels as he has been scoring regularly at international level.

"Do you want to put an end to my career? I have been good in my position," said Tapu with a laugh adding that he knows who are the highest scorers of the SAFF Championship for Bangladesh. Tapu is one goal short of catching Rokonuzzaman Kanchan and Zahid Hasan Emily who scored five goals each in SAFF Championship. 

"To be honest, I really like to score goals. That's why sometimes go upfront to get goals from set-pieces but my first responsibility is to protect my defense, then score goals if possible," the player said.

Tapu will remain busy in stopping Indian forwards Sunil Chhetri and others in today's match, although he will be keen to help the team score goals from the set-pieces.

Mahabubur Rahman Sufil will no doubt be hoping to stay always on top of the highest goal scorers' chart in the squad whenever he gets into the pitch sporting the red and green jersey. Sufil, who had struck against Bhutan, Laos, Nepal (two) and Kygyzstan, came on in the second half against Sri Lanka on Friday but could not show his goal-scoring instinct as a substitute player.

Biplu Ahmed, Matin Mia, Mohammad Ibrahim and Saad Uddin are expected to start against India and the team management will be hoping from them to exploit their goal-scoring ability against India, who did not lose to Bangladesh in the last 18 years.