Former India captain Rahul Dravid and former South Africa captain Graeme Smith have given a thumbs down to the format of the World Cup starting in Australia and New Zealand on February 14. They were speaking on CONTENDERS, an ESPNcricinfo special programme building up to the tournament.

"It's almost easy barring the odd upset or someone really having a bad tournament; you can almost predict who the top eight will be sitting here in the studio today," Dravid said. "There comes a time in a tournament like this - and I sensed it a little bit during the last World Cup when I wasn't playing but just watching - that everyone starts to wait for the quarterfinals. Sure, in between you have some big games as well but you know eventually that these are going to be the best eight teams."

Smith was of the view that the format allows for a few "soft games" to be played. "As a team you know who is going to qualify but you are just trying to get some confidence out of that first phase and you don't want to mess up against one of the minnows, which is always a challenge as a top Test nation. You want to qualify for the quarterfinals as soon as possible."

The 14 participating teams at the World Cup have been divided into two groups of seven each. Every team plays the other six in its group once. The four top teams from each group qualify for the quarterfinals. The same format was followed for the 2011 World Cup and much like that tournament it is expected that the top eight Test nations will go through to the knockout stages with Bangladesh, Zimbabwe and the four Associate teams - Ireland, Scotland, UAE and Afghanistan - missing out.

Smith said that the 2007 and 2011 World Cups, where he led South Africa, were "very long." "You start the tournament with this great hype and then it hits a lull. In both tournaments we had 10-12 day breaks between games at some stages which is a long time to just sit around in parts of another country in a World Cup. The experiences I have had with the football and rugby World Cups is that every weekend there is a big challenge and you are looking forward to the next game. I think that's crucial for us to create to keep cricket on the map around the world: keeping it competitive."

Dravid said "the best format" was that of the 1999 and 2003 World Cups, where the group stage was followed by the super sixes before the semifinals and the final. "You had to play well throughout the tournament. It gave you a bit of a chance to recover, if you started off slowly as we did in 2003. When three teams qualified for the super six stage, every game mattered. Points got carried over as well, so you knew you couldn't relax in any of the games because if you lose a game, you don't get to carry over those points.

"They need to just tighten it up, ensure that it's a shorter tournament and have a format where it's just not easy to predict who the top eight teams are going to be. There should be some tension in the top eight sides that if they mess up they won't qualify for the super sixes."

Smith said the presence of four Associate sides undermined the status of the World Cup as "cricket's iconic event."

"People tune in to watch this event from around the world. If you look at the marketing events teams are having in their own countries, there is great interest in this event. I feel that tournaments like the World T20 and Champions Trophy will be an opportune time to give these nations the chance to play but I think the ICC needs to incentivise these nations more so they grow on a consistent basis, not just give them a World Cup every four years. Help these nations grow, then the pool of cricket is growing and getting stronger and stronger. I think throwing them into an event like this every four years is a bit hit-and-miss and takes away from what is an iconic event for cricket."