I actually enjoy watching the qualifiers. But 32 to 48 sort of already made those blah anyway, so I don't care too much about watering them down even more.
I would prefer going back to 32, or even 24, and doing away with the continental qualifying format, and doing maybe annual summer staggered qualifying tournaments that were larger events. The whole thing could be the World Cup, with every 4 years just being the World Cup final tournament