The former goalkeeper thinks the relaunched tournament – which will feature 32 teams from around the world – will “flog” players who already take part in too many games for purely financial reasons.

He fumed to FourFourTwo magazine: “I think it’s a joke.

“You’ve got the best players and the best teams in the world complaining about too many games, then you introduce this tournament.

“You’re trying to work out who benefits, especially when you look at some of the outfits in it, who – as far as I can consider – haven’t even got a world ranking of the stature to be involved with the best in the world.

“The old format was fine. This format just looks like an opportunity for someomne to make more money out of players. They’re being flogged for it.”

David called on his old club Manchester City to claim their senior players are injured and “send the youth team” instead.

He said: “If I were Manchester City, I would declare my entire first team injured and send the youth team to the Club World Cup…

“I know there’s some obligation for being in it that you have to put your best team forward, but if players are injured, they’re injured, so declare them injured.

“You’ve got sports science teams looking at recovery periods – if you’re a team like Man City, most of your squad is involved in international duty as well, and what benefit is it to a club when the players you depend on for nine months of the season are being compromised for one competition?”