No es posible que Miguel gane a Paco.
Primera, ¿Por qué no hay "a" enfrente de Miguel pero hay un "a" en frente del Paco?
También...
Why is it "gane" and not "gana"?
I think the sentence is saying "It is not possible that Miguel beat Paco.
He's in disbelief that Miguel beat Paco. So it's saying that he really did beat Paco. That's factual. Why is it in subjunctive?
2 Answers
Just another take, on the first part of your question. This part will be easy to remember. (the second part still confuses me, because in class, we usually use subjunctive with posible, and indicative with no es posible, so I¨m lost too)
There is no ´a´ in front of Miguel, because he is the subject. The subject doesn´t get a personal ´a´. Only the objects do.
Well, first, the a is before Paco since any verb that is done to a person has what's called the personal a to signify that the object is a person. It's not before Miguel because there is no verb doing anything to Miguel. Second, ganar is in the subjunctive because the clause no es posible que is always a clause that warrants the subjunctive. Other clauses that call for the subjunctive would be es posible que, es probable que, es bueno que, etc....
The sentence is more getting at the meaning "It's not possible for Miguel to beat Paco." If you wanted to say "It's not possible that Miguel beat Paco" I think you'd need the present perfect subjunctive: "No es posible que Miguel haya ganado a Paco."
