How Reporting Verbs Control What Comes Next

When you report what someone said, thought, suggested, or promised, you need a reporting verb — and the verb you choose determines the grammar that follows it. This is the core challenge: different reporting verbs demand different structures, and there's no single rule that covers them all. You have to learn which verb takes which pattern.

There are three main patterns:

• Verb + that-clause: She explained that the meeting had been cancelled.
• Verb + gerund (-ing): He suggested leaving early.
• Verb + infinitive (to + verb): They agreed to help us.

Some verbs accept more than one pattern, but many do not — and mixing them up produces sentences that sound broken to a native speaker.

That-Clauses: The Most Flexible Pattern

Verbs like say, explain, mention, complain, admit, deny, promise, agree, insist, and suggest can all be followed by a that-clause. The word that is often dropped in speech, but the clause structure remains.

✅ She admitted that she had made a mistake. ✅ She admitted she had made a mistake. (dropping "that" — both fine)

This pattern is the safest when you're unsure, because so many reporting verbs accept it. But not every verb does — you can't say "She recommended that to leave early" as though recommend works like want.

Gerunds and Infinitives: Where Learners Get Tripped Up

Here's where things get tricky. Some verbs take only a gerund, some take only an infinitive, and some take both (sometimes with a change in meaning or structure).

Gerund verbs — suggest, recommend, deny, admit, mention, consider:

✅ He denied stealing the money. ❌ He denied to steal the money.

Infinitive verbs — agree, offer, promise, refuse, threaten, decide:

✅ She refused to answer the question. ❌ She refused answering the question.

Some infinitive verbs need an object before the infinitive — advise, encourage, remind, warn, persuade, invite:

✅ The doctor advised him to rest for a week. ❌ The doctor advised him resting for a week.

Notice that advise behaves differently depending on whether there's an object. Without one, it can take a gerund: The doctor advised resting. With an object, it needs an infinitive: The doctor advised him to rest. This kind of shift catches even good intermediate learners off guard.

The "Suggest" Trap and Other Common Errors

The single most common mistake at B1–B2 level involves suggest. Learners treat it like other verbs and add an object pronoun plus an infinitive — probably because that pattern is so common elsewhere.

❌ She suggested me to try the new restaurant. ✅ She suggested trying the new restaurant. ✅ She suggested that I try the new restaurant.

Suggest never takes an object + infinitive. The same applies to recommend and propose:

❌ He recommended us to book in advance. ✅ He recommended booking in advance. ✅ He recommended that we book in advance.

Another frequent error is confusing say and tell. Both report speech, but tell requires a personal object and say does not:

✅ She said that it was too late. ❌ She said me that it was too late. ✅ She told me that it was too late. ❌ She told that it was too late.

When in doubt, build a short mental checklist: Does this verb need an object before the next structure? Does it take -ing, to + verb, or a that-clause? Over time the patterns become automatic, but at first, learning them verb by verb — especially the irregular ones like suggest, deny, and advise — is the most reliable path forward.