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I regularly use the Grammarly application and keep getting error messages for the following types of sentences:

I like F.C. Barcelona, and was happy to learn they recently signed a new player.

After studying for the ACT, I learned that a comma before the coordinating conjunction "and" in this sentence without "I" after it was OK as long an elliptical construction was being used.

However, is this sentence not a good example of an elliptical construction and therefore requires "I"?

I like F.C. Barcelona, and I was happy to learn they recently signed a new player.

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  • Thank you. I just looked that concept up and it makes sense to me now. – user27343 Oct 5 '18 at 1:54
  • It's OK. In your example "I [like F.C. Barcelona], and [was happy to learn they recently signed a new player], the bracketed elements are a coordination of verb phrases with the common subject "I". The comma is not a foolproof test, though it's not necessary here. – BillJ Oct 5 '18 at 7:24
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Your example sentence does not include an elliptical construction. Grammarly is right to show you an error because the part after "and" does not introduce a new subject and therefore does not act as a clause.

An elliptical construction is a construction where an element of the sentence can be inferred despite not being included. An elliptical construction cannot omit either subject or verb and still be a clause, though.

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    Thank you. I will have to go over elliptical constructions again. Just wondering, but what rule allows you to use a comma before "though"? – user27343 Oct 5 '18 at 1:10
  • You should probably create a new question to ask about that one. There are different ways to use the word "though", and each requires different uses of the comma. You can't put line breaks or most formatting in comments, so this isn't the best place to try to write a detailed answer. – R Mac Oct 5 '18 at 2:27

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