B2 First · Grammar · Pattern 3 of 10
The tense shift, the pronoun shift, and the verbs with their own patterns — admit doing, refuse to do, accuse somebody of.
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'I'll call you tomorrow,' Ben said to Lucy.
WOULD
Ben told Lucy that he the following day.
Two different skills hide under one label. The first is the mechanical shift: 'I'll call you tomorrow' becomes 'he would call her the following day' — tense back one step, pronouns changed for the new speaker, time words moved. Part 4 usually gives you the time word and tests the tense and the pronoun.
The second skill is the reporting verb with its own grammar. 'Admit' takes -ing, 'refuse' takes a to-infinitive, 'accuse' needs 'of' plus -ing, 'suggest' takes -ing or a that-clause and never 'suggest somebody to do'. These are not reported speech at all in the textbook sense; they are verb patterns wearing reported speech as a costume, and they are where the marks are.
Questions. A reported question keeps statement word order and loses 'did': 'asked Amy where she had bought'. Candidates carry the question order across ('where had she bought') and lose the mark on a structure they know perfectly well in statements.
The negative instruction. 'Don't touch' becomes 'warned us not to touch' — 'not' before 'to', never after it. And the verbs whose meaning already holds the negative: 'refused to lend' has no 'not' in it because 'refuse' is 'say no'.
Look at the key word first. If it is a reporting verb — ADMITTED, SUGGESTED, ACCUSED — the item is about that verb's pattern, and the tense shift matters less than the -ing, the 'to' or the preposition after it. If it is WOULD, HAD or WHETHER, the item is the mechanical shift, and you work through tense, pronoun and word order in that order.
Then count. 'Admitted that he had broken' is five words and fine; 'admitted that he had broken the' is six and scores nothing even though the gap sentence ends in 'the window'. The gap ends where the second sentence picks the words up again.
In Part 4, treat it as yes. Spoken English often leaves the tense alone when the statement is still true, but the exam item is built around the shift and the accepted answers reflect it. The drill lists every form the mark scheme would take.
Admit, deny, suggest, refuse, promise, warn, accuse, apologise, remind and insist cover most B2 items. The pattern to learn with each one is not the meaning — you know the meaning — but what follows it: -ing, to-infinitive, or a preposition.
