Choose the most suitable option to replace the highlighted part of the sentence:
No sooner had I reached the station when the train departed.
Show answer & explanation
Correct answer: A
Explanation
The correct answer is option 1 i.e. than the train departed.
Error Concept: Incorrect use of the conjunction “when” with “No sooner.”
What is wrong: The conjunction “when” is incorrectly used after “No sooner.” The correct correlative pair is “No sooner… than.”
Grammar Concept:
When using “No sooner” at the beginning of a sentence, it is followed by an inversion (auxiliary + subject) and paired with “than” — not “when.”
Structure:
No sooner + had + subject + past participle + than + clause (simple past).
Incorrectness of the concept in context: The use of “when” breaks the grammatical rule of the correlative conjunction, making the sentence incorrect.
Correction: Replace “when” with “than.”
Corrected phrase: than the train departed.
Final sentence: No sooner had I reached the station than the train departed.
Hence, the chosen option is correct.