It would be great if he could

[Banglardon]

Hi there, I often see "It would be nice if..............could" is used a lot. Can I also used the following to mean the same? Are they quite interchangeable

1- Messi is a very good football player. It would be great if he could win the Champions League for his team this year.
2- Messi is a very good football player. It would be great if he won the Champions League for his team this year.
3- Messi is a very good football player. It would be great if he would win the Champions League for his team this year.

 

[jutfrank]

No and no.

 

[Banglardon]

Could you please explain?

 

[jutfrank]

You shouldn't think of It would be nice if ... could ... as having any particular meaning. The meaning of the phrase comes from the speaker, and the situation that he/she is in.

Let me show you two different examples, where the phrase has very different uses:

Situation 1: Tania comes home to find that her husband Abdul has failed to tidy up the house:

Tania: The place is a mess, Abdul! It would be nice if you could help with the housework every now and then, you know!


Situation 2: Tania is writing a text message to her friend Sharmin, inviting her to a party:

Tania: "Hi Sharmin. Abdul and I are having a small gathering at our place tomorrow afternoon. I understand that you're busy this week but it would be nice if you could come."



Here are two additional pieces of advice for you, Banglardon:

1) The adjective nice is not simply a synonym of great.
2) You should work on the assumption that nothing in English is ever really interchangeable with anything else, because it's rare that that ever is the case.

 

[emsr2d2]

Can I also [STRIKE]used[/STRIKE] use the following to mean the same? Are they [STRIKE]quite[/STRIKE] interchangeable?

Note my corrections above. I don't know what you thought "quite interchangeable" means but it's wrong. Two things are either interchangeable or they're not.