What Did the Manager Say?
Narrated example
Direct Speech
We have already made a decision.
Reported Speech
The manager said they had already made a decision.
Present Perfect → Past Perfect
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General English · Essentials
Reported Speech: Beyond the Basics — Free preview
B1+A short opening excerpt. Explore the full lesson in General English Essentials.
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00:01 Reported speech beyond the basics.
00:04 What did the manager say?
00:07 Imagine you are updating a colleague who missed an important meeting.
00:11 Your manager said, we have already made a decision.
00:16 How would you report that?
00:18 You could say, the manager said they had already made a decision.
00:23 Notice how the tense changes, even though the meaning stays the same.
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