Chapter 17: Exploring More Important Verb Structures 261
Put students in pairs and have one student accuse the other of doing some-
thing and the other can apologise with an excuse. You just need to provide
the students with the situations. For example, students discussing a football
match may have a dialogue like this:
Pierre: You arrived late for the game! I’m so annoyed.Valerie: I’m sorry but if you had given me the right directions, I would
have been on time.
Pierre: But you didn’t bring my boots.Valerie: I’m afraid if you had left your boots in the usual place, I would
have been able to find them.
Pierre: You don’t understand! I couldn’t play!Valerie: Don’t worry! Even if you’d played, the team would have lost. The
score was 12-0.