"Recently" can absolutely modify "growing." In fact, that's the option that makes most sense here. However, this problem is a flawed imitation of a real problem (#53 in the 2016 OG Verbal Review, #48 in the previous edition). In that problem, the phrase "recent extended sales slump" was correct, differing greatly in meaning from "recently extended sales slump," which is grammatically okay but makes it sound like someone chose to extend the slump.

This problem doesn't mirror the logic of the original and doesn't really make sense in its current form. I'd recommend that everyone ignore it and focus on the official version.
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Why cant recently modify adjective growing ?
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I thought the rule was that adverbs could modify adjectives, verbs, and other adverbs. Why can't recently modify growing?

Again, "recently" can modify "growing," and in this case, it should. See my post above.
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Here is how I approach the question

Basically I look at growing as an adjective (gerund) just to test whether to use recent or recently I replace growing with the noun form (growth)

Would it make sense to say recently growth or recent growth?

I hope this clarifies your inquiries.

All the best

Salsanousi, you are mixing up adjective forms (present participles) and noun forms (gerunds). In this case, "growing" is serving as an adjective. It's not a gerund, and should not be modified by "recent." If we used "recent" here, it would modify "list," not "growing."
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Ans: A

This is how I reasoned:

Cut 1: Conditional Tenses

The second half of the sentence mentions "the team would start a month......"
Since WOULD is used, we cannot combine this with a present tense as in options B,C and D. All these options use present tense (is, has)
Had the second half of the sentence said " the team WILL start a month...." , Is and Has could've been used

Cut 2: SVA

The team is singular, therefore, IT has to be used.

Hi,
Can someone clarify the point, why- 'recently', an adverb, cannot modify an adjective 'growing'.
As we all know, an adverb modifies anything other than a noun.

Correct me if I m wrong and help me clarify the use of "recent" in this purview of this question.\

Thanks in advance

Hi,

Adverbs can modify adjectives so I don't understand why this is wrong?

"The baseball team said" is in past so the difficulties also need to be in past.
B, C, D use present tense and can be eliminated.
"its" is not the correct pronoun for "team" so A can be eliminated.
E it is.
Rather easy.
Happy if it is really a hard question

B C D all are in the wrong tense. E uses a plural pronoun (their) for a singular noun (team)

Why option E is wrong? In British English collective nouns are considered singular whereas plural in American English. It is impossible to differentiate them, if there is no hint regarding them, such as verb tense, of modifier added to them indication plural or singular,etc.

In the below mentioned question, the answer E takes singular pronoun for collective noun 'Public'.

Hi avinashiitp,

1. I don't know which (other) question you are referring to, but there is an it in the non-underlined portion of the sentence. That decides the issue.

2. You can also take a look at the official question that this question is based on.

3. It's actually the opposite: BrE, plural/singular, AmE, generally singular.

4. It's not as if collective nouns are always considered plural in BrE. They are just more likely to be considered plural.
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Hi AjiteshArun

You are absolutely write about the it(completely missed that) in the non underlined part.

Regarding the other question, I forgot to remove that statement in my post.

Again, thank you for your explanation.