Breakdown of Die Spieler lachen oft übereinander.
lachen
to laugh
oft
often
der
who, which, that (relative pronoun; die, das)
der Spieler
the player
Questions & Answers about Die Spieler lachen oft übereinander.
How does übereinander work in this sentence?
It combines the preposition über (about) with the reciprocal word einander (each other). Because the verb lachen requires the preposition über when you laugh about something, they fuse together into the single word übereinander to mean about each other.
Could I say lachen über sich instead?
That would change the meaning. If you used the reflexive pronoun sich, it would mean the players are laughing about themselves. Using übereinander makes it reciprocal, meaning they laugh at each other.
Is it ever correct to write this as two separate words, like über einander?
No, whenever a preposition is used with einander, they must be merged into a single word. It is always spelled as übereinander.
How can we tell that Die Spieler is plural here since the word doesn't have a plural ending?
The noun Spieler looks exactly the same in its singular and plural forms. You can tell it is plural here by looking at the surrounding words: the plural article Die (instead of the masculine singular Der) and the plural verb form lachen (instead of lacht).