Hi, Elena. In reported speech, we often do something called 'backshifting'. This means that the Present Simple changes to the Past Simple, the Present Continuous changes to the Past Continuous, the Past Simple changes to the Past Perfect, etc. For example: Ken: "I like apples." Peter: "Ken said he liked apples." It doesn't mean he liked them in the past, but no longer does, it's simply the way we often (but not always) backshift in reported speech. In this case, it would be the speaker's choice to backshift or to say “Ken SAID he LIKES apples (because it’s still true)”, or even “Ken SAYS he lIKES apples.” Another example: If what Ken says is already in the past simple, we can backshift to the past perfect. Ken: "I saw Sarah at the supermarket." Peter: "Ken said he had seen Sarah at the supermarket." OR, without backshifting "Ken said he saw Sarah at the supermarket." It's often simply the speaker's choice, but not always. In your example: "He said he loved her", it’s simply a case of backshifting. If he no longer loved her you would report it as "He said he used to love her." (Or "He said he loved her once, but no longer does."). If you can find some notes on the rules for reported speech, it will help you a lot. Good luck with it!

Both are correct but it depends in what you want to say. "He said he loved her" would be used to say that he Loved her and he doesnt love her anymore, now he does not love her but he did in the past "he said he loves her" would be used to say that he still loves her now. I hope this helps!

I might know English quite badly, but I wonder: doesn't sequence of tenses have to do here? "He said he loves her" as far as I know is grammatically incorrect sentence, while "He said he loved her" would be the right one. What does it mean? It means that he once told her "I love you", and now, when you're saying "He said he loved her", he can still love her or not, we don't know. If you want to say that he loved, but he doesn't anymore, you should say "He said he had loved her". Again, I might be wrong, so I hope someone more competent will light this question.

Loved = past Loves = present Once upon a time, I loved a girl from Brazil He says he still loves her. Simplest explanation I could think of :)

Great question! The short answer is they are both correct depending on the intended message. Past vs Present. The long answer is that there is a nuance here that you might be interested in and the word "loved" could be implied to be in the present tense depending on the context of the conversation. Let me try to explain: A person could say: "John broke up with me for Mary! He said he loved her." This sentence implies that he loved Mary AND currenly loves Mary. You could also use the other sentence, the one with "loves", and get the same meaning. This nuance happens because of the word "said" which is past tense. If the present tense "says" is substituted the meaning becomes a little clearer: "He says he loved her" (maybe past) and "He says he loves her." (clearly present) If the intended message is "He loved her and loves her now". It doesn't matter which sentence is used. They are both grammatically correct and both would be understood the same in the context of the conversation. I hope this helps and isn't too confusing.