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It is merely in the past few seasons that women in the subcontinent have gained recognition as professional cricket players. For generations, they faced scorn, censure, exclusion – even the threat of physical harm – to pursue their passion. Currently, India is staging a World Cup with a prize fund of $13.8 million, where the home nation's players could become beloved icons if they secure their first championship win.

This would, therefore, be a travesty if this weekend's talk focused on their men's teams. And yet, when India face Pakistan on Sunday, comparison are unavoidable. Not because the host team are strong favorites to win, but because they are not expected to exchange greetings with their opposition. The handshake controversy, as it's been dubbed, will have a another chapter.

In case you weren't aware of the original drama, it took place at the conclusion of the men's group match between India and Pakistan at the continental championship last month when the India captain, Suryakumar Yadav, and his squad disappeared the pitch to evade the customary post-game post-match ritual. Two same-y sequels transpired in the Super4 match and the final, climaxing in a protracted presentation ceremony where the new champions declined to receive the cup from the Pakistan Cricket Board's head, Mohsin Naqvi. The situation might have seemed comic if it hadn't been so distressing.

Those following the female cricket World Cup might well have anticipated, and even imagined, a different approach on Sunday. Female athletics is supposed to provide a new blueprint for the sports world and an different path to negative traditions. The sight of Harmanpreet Kaur's team members extending the hand of camaraderie to Fatima Sana and her squad would have sent a powerful statement in an increasingly divided world.

Such an act could have recognized the shared challenging circumstances they have overcome and provided a meaningful gesture that politics are temporary compared with the connection of female solidarity. It would certainly have deserved a place alongside the additional good news story at this tournament: the exiled Afghanistan cricketers welcomed as guests, being reintegrated into the sport four years after the Taliban forced them to flee their country.

Instead, we've collided with the hard limits of the female athletic community. No one is shocked. India's men's players are huge stars in their homeland, worshipped like deities, treated like royalty. They enjoy all the benefits and power that accompanies stardom and wealth. If Yadav and his side are unable to defy the diktats of an authoritarian prime minister, what hope do the female players have, whose improved position is only recently attained?

Maybe it's more astonishing that we're still talking about a handshake. The Asia Cup furore prompted much analysis of that specific sporting ritual, especially because it is viewed as the definitive symbol of fair play. But Yadav's snub was much less important than what he said right after the initial match.

The India captain considered the winners' podium the "ideal moment" to dedicate his team's victory to the armed forces who had taken part in India's attacks on Pakistan in May, referred to as Operation Sindoor. "My wish is they continue to motivate us all," Yadav informed the post-game reporter, "and we give them further cause in the field whenever we get an opportunity to make them smile."

This reflects the current reality: a real-time discussion by a team captain openly celebrating a armed attack in which dozens lost their lives. Previously, Australian cricketer Usman Khawaja was unable to display a solitary humanitarian message approved by the ICC, including the dove logo – a direct emblem of harmony – on his bat. Yadav was subsequently fined 30% of his match fee for the comments. He was not the only one disciplined. Pakistan's Haris Rauf, who mimicked aircraft crashing and made "six-zero" gestures to the crowd in the later game – also referencing the hostilities – received the identical penalty.

This isn't a matter of not respecting your rivals – this is sport co-opted as patriotic messaging. There's no use to be morally outraged by a missing greeting when that's merely a minor plot development in the narrative of two countries already employing cricket as a political lever and instrument of indirect conflict. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi made that explicit with his social media post after the final ("Operation Sindoor on the games field. The result remains unchanged – India wins!"). Naqvi, on his side, proclaims that athletics and governance shouldn't mix, while holding dual roles as a government minister and chair of the PCB, and publicly tagging the Indian leader about his country's "embarrassing losses" on the war front.

The takeaway from this episode shouldn't be about cricket, or the Indian side, or Pakistan, in separation. It serves as a caution that the concept of sports diplomacy is over, for the time being. The same sport that was employed to build bridges between the countries 20 years ago is now being used to heighten hostilities between them by people who are fully aware what they're attempting, and massive followings who are active supporters.

Division is affecting every realm of society and as the most prominent of the global soft powers, athletics is constantly vulnerable: it's a form of leisure that directly invites you to pick a side. Plenty who find India's gesture towards Pakistan aggressive will nonetheless champion a Ukrainian tennis player's entitlement to refuse to greet a Russian competitor on the court.

Should anyone still believe that the athletic field is a magical safe space that unites countries, review the golf tournament recap. The conduct of the New York crowds was the "perfect tribute" of a golf-loving president who publicly provokes animosity against his adversaries. Not only did we witness the decline of the typical sporting principles of equity and mutual respect, but the speed at which this might be normalized and tacitly approved when sportspeople themselves – such as US captain Keegan Bradley – refuse to recognise and sanction it.

A post-game greeting is meant to represent that, at the end of every competition, however intense or heated, the competitors are putting off their simulated rivalry and acknowledging their shared human bond. If the enmity isn't pretend – demanding that its players come out in outspoken endorsement of their national armed forces – then what is the purpose with the arena of sports at all? You might as well put on the military uniform now.