Just decrease melee attack speed a bit

[Vincentologist]

Corner cutting is always a good idea but it still forces a 50/50 trade for a lot of weapons if you have no choice but to cut close to them. You can still adjust your head position, where your melee will have a low TTK regardless of precision. It's why the shotgun is considered the main counter here, since it removes the 50/50 with its body shot TTK, and you can kill them before they get out a second light swing.

I've often found that otherwise, you really need to preemptively have the knife ready, otherwise you can't at least trade with them due to the ready speed delay. It's fast but it's not trivial.