Nightmare007
After Georgio's cafe got a favorable review in a travel guidebook, the number of tourists eating there were in excess of the number of local customers going regularly.
(A) were in excess of the number of local customers
(B) had an excess over the local customers who were
(C) exceeded the local customers who were
(D) numbered more than the local customers
(E) exceeded the number of local customers
Just wanted to verify my understanding:
A : Wrong ==> "Number of" is Singular . So we can get rid of Option A as it has "were". SV doesn't agree. Additionally "In Excess" sounded weird when I was looking at the meaning of the whole sentence. So my question is , if the SV matched in this case .. can it be a right answer or my logic of eliminating it because of meaning confusion is correct?
B : Number ==> had an excess over the local customer is wrong. Number cannot be in excess over customers themselves.
C : Number cannot exceed the local customer itself. It has to exceed the number of local customer
D : Number of Customers ==> Numbered is wrong
E: Correct for the reason mentioned in C