India win hands down, skip the handshake with Pakistan: ‘We stand with families of victims of Pahalgam’, says Surya

This was the first India-Pakistan cricket match since the Pahalgam terror attack in April. India launched Operation Sindoor against terror targets in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir and Pakistan in May, following which both countries launching retaliatory strikes at each other for three days before suspension of hostilities.

Sunday’s match would be remembered for what did not happen, rather than what did unfold. The hands that never shook will hog the headlines, rather than the calloused hands of India’s spin-triumvirate that designed the victory and the composed batsmen that guided them past the total. Once India’s well-drilled spinners restricted Pakistan to 127 and Abhishek Sharma reeled them off to a blistering start, the climax of the game was a foregone conclusion.

Pakistan’s captain Salman Agha, right, walks past India’s captain Suryakumar Yadav after the coin toss ahead of the Asia Cup cricket match between India and Pakistan at Dubai International Cricket Stadium in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, Sunday, Sept. 14, 2025. (AP Photo/Altaf Qadri)

The climax would fade into irrelevance. But the start would not.

The ungiven handshake would be talked about in years. Yadav is learnt to have made up his mind in the morning of the game. Hours before the game, he conveyed his decision to the team. He, however, told his team that it was left to individual choice, whether to shake hands with their Pakistani counterparts. The players are aware of the outrage back home. But as the Indian cricket board and government had agreed to play Pakistan in Dubai, they were left with no choice.

“The BCCI and the government had aligned to play the game, so only the game was on our mind. The decision (not to shake hands) was taken later,” Yadav said at the post-match press conference.

The only contact he made with a Pakistani cricketer was when Mohammed Nawaz, back-tracking to take a return catch of Tilak Varma, bumped into him. In sync with the game, neither apologised.

Before the toss, the players and support staff from both teams inspected the pitch almost side by side. But they barely acknowledged each other’s presence, or exchanged pleasantries, as though they were blind to each other’s presence. On one side of the pitch, India did their warm-ups; on the other side, Pakistan’s bowlers were bowling full tilt on the practice wicket.

A feverish energy wrapped the ground during the game. But there was little in terms of theatrics that would make the highlights reel of the game for ages, like the Venkatesh Prasad send-off or the Javed Miandad monkey hop. Still, the contest seemed to bubble on the threshold of boiling point. A nudge or push away from going berserk.

The usually relaxed and smiling Yadav was more sombre. Hardik Pandya seemed an enraged man. The Indian fielders stretched every sinew to grasp a tough catch or thwart a boundary after Pakistan elected to bat first. The emotions were similar when Pakistan took the field, with the usually inexpressive Salman Agha urging his colleagues to fight. But after Abhishek Sharma’s blistering start, they slowly, and numbly, reconciled with the reality of an imminent defeat.

Soon, the emotions settled into a pattern. Pakistan supporters were heard only when their batsmen hit boundaries, which arrived few and far between, and when umpteen lbw decisions were overturned. India’s supporters had more licence to celebrate, as the well-worn spin trio foxed Pakistan’s batsmen with their varied trickery. It took a few lusty blows from Shaheen Afridi to brighten them.

Indian players rode an emotional wave throughout the game, especially at the start when they appealed for everything, rejoicing the fall of wickets jubilantly and gasping when marginal decisions did not favour them. However, they uncharacteristically spilled two catches, both return catches, the culprits being Kuldeep Yadav and Varun Chakaravarthy.

India’s Axar Patel celebrates with captain Suryakumar Yadav, left, after the dismissal of Pakistan’s Fakhar Zaman, rear right, during the Asia Cup cricket match between India and Pakistan at Dubai International Cricket Stadium in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, Sunday, Sept. 14, 2025. (AP Photo/Fatima Shbair)

Unlike the players, the crowd displayed more bonhomie. The sights and sounds were familiar; faces smeared in tricolour or dark green, bodies draped in team jerseys, wearying limbs waving the flags, the louder and energetic ones chorusing, “Jeetega bhai jeetega, Pakistan jeetega” or the counter: “Harega bhai harega, Pakistan ko hum harayega”. Some of the fans merrily bonded with each other. An India supporter, wearing a Ravindra Jadeja jersey, was seen fist-pumping with a pair of Pakistan fans, besides taking selfies with them and hugging them when dispersing to their assigned seats.

Still, unlike most other games between them, one of the most sellable fixtures in all sport, the odd vacant seat could be spotted, in a stadium that could hold only 25,000.

But the contest was one-sided, as it has panned out in the last decade. Over the years, it has defined the two proud cricketing nations. But in the last decade, the much-proclaimed biggest game in the sport has rarely been the most thrilling, particularly since this fixture became restricted to being a tournament-only affair, bilateral series between the two extinguished by political feuding, since 2013.

But there has not been a match between India and Pakistan yet that has lacked a sweaty intensity. It was not a night that would be etched into the folklore of the rivalry’s history, the game-winning six would not be remembered. But the hands that never shook will be.