Second Conditional

Second Conditional

By Adriënne Riemersma

The second conditional is like the first conditional. We are still thinking about the future. We are thinking about a particular condition in the future, and the result of this condition. But there is not a real possibility that this condition will happen.

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For example, you do not have a lottery ticket. Is it possible to win? No! No lottery ticket, no win! But maybe you will buy a lottery ticket in the future. So you can think about winning in the future, like a dream. It's not very real, but it's still possible.

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​If I won the lottery, I would buy a new car.

Sentence order

There are 2 ways to form the second conditional sentence. ​

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You can put the "if"-sentence first, but also at the end. Remember that if in the first part, means a comma. ​If in the second part, means no comma!

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If Sarah married Tom, she would be happy. (comma!)

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Sarah would be happy if she married Tom. ​(no comma!)

Let op!

Bij if-zinnen met I als onderwerp, dan krijgt I were en niet was!

If I were a princess, I would have 100 horses (and a handsome prince!)​

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Form

We use the Past Simple (ww+ed/ 2e rijtje) tense to talk about the future condition. We use would + infinitive to talk about the future result. The important thing about the second conditional is that there is an unreal possibility that the condition will happen.