Asia Cup 2025: A handshake that never was; Not a pleasant sight, but don't blame the players

Dubai: As a contest, India’s comprehensive dismissal of Pakistan on Sunday night had little to offer, but there were numerous talking points, not least the shake of hands that wasn’t, either before the start of the game or at its conclusion.

Conventionally, captains of opposing teams shake hands and exchange team sheets before the toss. Once the dust has settled, players line up to congratulate and wish each other well, a mark of respect for the effort on the park, no matter the outcome. It’s been the practice since time immemorial, one of the many unwritten codes which cricket, and numerous other disciplines, swear by.

From time to time, such niceties are shelled. Elina Svitolina, the Ukraine tennis player, has refrained from shaking hands with Russian and Belarussian players from the time Russia attacked her homeland in February 2022. In 1991, after losing the Eastern Conference finals 0-4 to Michael Jordan’s Chicago Bulls, the Detroit Pistons pointedly refused to shake hands, perhaps one reason why no Pistons stars, including legendary point guard Isiah Thomas, figured in the Dream Team that represented the USA in the 1992 Barcelona Olympics.

New Zealand’s cricketers refused to come out of their dressing-room to greet their English rivals after a One-Day International at the Oval in June 2008, incensed that the hosts ran Grant Elliott out when he was sprawled in the middle of the pitch after a collision with bowler Ryan Sidebottom. Sri Lanka did likewise against Bangladesh in the 2023 World Cup league clash in Delhi after the latter won an appeal for ‘timed out’ against former skipper Angelo Mathews.

Both these cricketing instances stemmed from on-field incidents where the two protagonists saw things differently. The origin of India’s no-handshake policy lies in the terror attack on holidaying tourists in Pahalgam on April 22, a cowardly attack that claimed 26 lives.

Given how things have unfolded over the last five days here, it is evident that India’s cricketers were clearly acting on instructions from higher up – whether that is from the team management, the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) or from those occupying the corridors of political power is open to speculation.

One isn’t sure what the players’ individual or collective stance is; even privately, they don’t want to broach this subject for understandable reasons.

Suryakumar Yadav had attracted criticism for shaking hands with Asian Cricket Council (ACC) chairman Mohsin Naqvi, also the chairman of the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB), and his Pakistani counterpart Salman Agha at the mandatory captains’ press conference on Tuesday afternoon.

A couple of days later, calls to boycott the T20 Asia Cup match gathered momentum in India. The BCCI and the Indian players were misplaced targets of ire when they were merely toeing the sports ministry policy which greenlit engaging with Pakistan in multi-team competitions.

Perhaps as a damage-control exercise, whoever was tasked with making the final call decided that Suryakumar would not shake hands with Agha at the toss, and that irrespective of the result, India’s players would not greet or acknowledge the Pakistanis once the final ball was bowled.

The feeling of unease at a cricket match ending in such sterilised, rehearsed fashion did leave a not-so-pleasant taste in the mouth but it must not be forgotten that in the final analysis, the cricketers themselves were mere pawns doing the bidding of more influential forces.

Pakistan’s official protest at India’s lack of sportsmanship is primarily for optics. But it’s never a great sign when any match is remembered and dissected for things beyond the quality of cricket.