counters

“It was my least dangerous film,” Laxe counters, reminding me of his “Fire Will Come,” the 2019 arson thriller for which he cast actual firefighters.

There are no discarded once-frozen coffee drinks sweating rings onto wooden tables; no empty Styrofoam takeout containers littering kitchen counters mere inches away from the trash can.

“No, that looks like my local shopping mall,” counters another.

“I think we would have made another,” he counters.

When elite teams start to see less of the ball, and when the opposition isn't so pinned back, it becomes more important to have a solid midfield base that can block those quick-fire counters.