FCE Use of English Part 4, Test 15 Page 1
For questions 1-10, complete the second sentence so that it has a similar meaning to the first sentence, using the
word given. Do not change the word given. You must use between two and five words, including the word given.
Example:
I hate having potatoes for breakfast
FAVOURITE
Potatoes are ________________________ food to have for breakfast.
ANSWER: MY LEAST FAVOURITE
1 We spend four days moving all the furniture into the new flat.
US
It ________________________ move all the furniture into the new flat.
2 Liam was too slow and missed the morning train.
ENOUGH
Liam ________________________ catch the morning train.
3 My mother was the only one to come to the party.
FROM
Nobody came ________________________ my mother.
4 “Don’t come close to me” the stranger told me.
AGAINST
The stranger ________________________ to him.
5 She said that she succeeded because of sheer luck.
DOWN
She ________________________ sheer luck.
6 “Do you have any questions?” asked Jan.
IF
Jan wanted ________________________ any questions.
7 We don’t know for sure if they have met before.
TELL
It ________________________ they have met before.
8 His family hasn’t heard the news yet.
STILL
His family ________________________ the news.
9 When do you expect Charles to return?
COMING
When ________________________ back?
10 He began studying two months ago.
FOR
He ________________________ two months.
https://engexam.info/fce-use-of-english-part-4/ – FCE Practice with answers and explanations
FCE Use of English Part 4, Test 15 Page 2
Answers and explanations
1. Took us three days to. A phrase to show that you need a certain amount of time for a particular action. Don’t
forget to make the switch to Past Simple!
2. Was not quick enough to. Answering ‘did not have enough time’ is incorrect for two reasons. First, we need
‘to’ and there is no way to squeeze it into the given word limit without sacrificing meaning. Second, it is not
about shortage of time, but about Liam being slow.
3. To the party apart from. Be careful not to answer ‘except FROM’, as the correct phrasing is ‘except FOR’.
4. Advised/warned me against coming close. Both verbs work well with the preposition ‘against’ to show that
somebody tells you it is not a good idea to do something. Note that the gerund form should follow both
structures. Be mindful of the spelling: ‘advise’ is the verb and ‘advice’ is the noun spelling variant.
5. Put her success down to/Put down her success to. To put something down to something else means to give
something as a reason. In this case, her determination was the reason for her success.
6. To know if we had. Even though ‘whether’ is a perfect replacement for ‘if’, you should not be using it
because ‘if’ is given as a key word here and has to be present in the sentence.
7. Is hard/impossible to tell if/whether. If you can’t tell something, it means that you have no information
about it or you can’t be sure about the things you know. Note the interchangeability of ‘if’ and ‘whether’.
8. Still have/has not read the news. The word ‘family’ grammatically can be both singular and plural,
depending on whether we mean the family as a whole or each person individually.
9. Is Charles coming. Apart from using a phrasal verb, we resort to the Present Continuous to underline the
fact of a planned event.
10. Has been studying for. We cannot avoid using Present Perfect Continuous – we need the Perfect part
because we are not using ‘two months ago’, but simply ‘two months’. The Continuous part is dictated by the
preposition ‘for’.
https://engexam.info/fce-use-of-english-part-4/ – FCE Practice with answers and explanations
