In cricket and in football world cup qualifying, why must most of the matches be giant versus midget ?

Question

In cricket and in football world cup qualifying, why must most of the matches be giant versus midget with only a 1% chance of an upset (including a draw)? Why can't they have a system that creates more evenly matched games, and that allows countries to play someone of their own calibre? Why can't one of the two (world cup qualifying or continental cup qualifying) be played in higher and lower divisions ? Wouldn't a ladder system for test cricket and a system of divisions in the continents make for better suspense (they could have promotion & relegation and, if requested to, a short knockout tournament could still give you all the mismatches and the everybody-has-an-equal-chance-to-win you request)?

Answer 1

They do in Cricket
It is the ICC Trophy where all the minor teams have a tournament of their own to decide who the top 4 are who then qualify to play in the cricket world cup
Ireland won that trophy last time out and will be represented in the West Indies next summer

Answer 2

they don't. this season there are France Italy and Scotland all in the same euro grp, and in cricket the recent cup had the west indies against ski lanka in qualifying, they try to keep better nations apart in the qualifying stages to make the finals better, after all Spain v France in the finals would be a better game than say Malta v San marino

Answer 3

Teams are seeded, this keeps the better teams from meeting each other until the later rounds, I would hate to see France,Germany,Italy,England meeting in the opening rounds. Your Idea has Merit, but would mean too many games would have to be played.

Answer 4

i think it is so that the stadiums make more mony if it is giant v giant in final than midget v midget in final. Also it is more exiting to watch giant v giant because it is close
allthough you do have a point about calibre and an extra suspence