How to Use play second fiddle in a Sentence

play second fiddle

phrase

• Royal purple shouldn’t have to play second fiddle to a competing nail color.
  — Ariel Wodarcyk, InStyle, 18 July 2026
• In the first five years of its run, SNF played second fiddle to Fox’s American Idol.
  — Anthony Crupi, Sportico.com, 9 Sep. 2026
• Dembele played second fiddle to Mbappe and yet still scored six goals, placing him joint-fifth on the Golden Boot list with a total that would have won him the award in six of the past eight tournaments.
  — Tim Spiers, New York Times, 21 July 2026
• Though this had been her big break in Nashville, Parton was feeling confined by playing second fiddle to Wagoner, who, as her producer, often took control of the musical arrangements of her songs.
  — Stephanie Vander Wel, The Conversation, 28 Aug. 2026
• According to various reports, the spotlight will likely fall on the new Galaxy Z Fold 8 lineup of book-style devices while the simpler Galaxy Z Flip 8 plays second fiddle this time around.
  — Kimberly Gedeon, PC Magazine, 17 July 2026
• The rebellion was famously orchestrated by Wat Tyler (Cosmo Jarvis), but in this film the leader plays second fiddle to an anonymous farmer known only as Ploughman (Andrew Garfield).
  — Christian Zilko, IndieWire, 9 Sep. 2026