include up to the top four finishers in the strongest European domestic leagues has reduced the prestige of the UEFA Cup Winners' Cup (which was abolished and folded into the UEFA Cup) and the resulting expanded UEFA Cup. Consequently achieving a top three or four domestic league finish (which guarantees Champions League participation) became much more important than winning a domestic cup (which only guarantees entry to the UEFA Cup). Since the 2014–15 season, the UEFA Europa League's importance has improved somewhat as winners will enter the next season's UEFA Champions League at the group stage. The Conference League, created in 2021 as a demerge of the Europa League (the UEFA Cup's commercial name since it was rebranded to resolve its sporting and economic crisis in 2008), has also been described as a "Mickey Mouse cup" by that group. Champions League participation, and achieving a top three or four domestic league finish (which guarantees Champions League participation), has become much more important than winning a domestic cup (which only guarantees entry to the UEFA Cup) like the FA Cup or English Football League Cup. For instance the 2011–12 Copa del Rey had its final scheduled unusually late by the Royal Spanish Football Federation, so that it would allow the big clubs such as FC Barcelona and Real Madrid to focus on the Champions League. Another example was when Manchester United controversially withdrew from the 1999–2000 FA Cup, the first time the holders had done so, which combined with the UEFA Cup's decline (see above) has reduced the importance of the FA Cup and other domestic cups. United had earlier entered into the inaugural Club World Championship, supposedly to help England with its World Cup host bid, under pressure from the government and The FA. United stated that entering both the FA Cup and Club World Cup would overload their fixture schedule that would make it more difficult to defend their Champions League and Premiership titles, and claimed that they did not want to devalue the FA Cup by fielding a weaker side. The move benefited United as they received a two-week break and ended up winning the 1999–2000 league title by an 18-point margin, although they did not progress past the group stages of the Club World Cup. The withdrawal from the FA Cup, however, drew considerable criticism as this weakened the tournament's prestige and manager Alex Ferguson has since