5 Things Learned from Borussia Dortmund's 2015/16 Season
Even though they didn't come away with any silverware, the 2015/16 season has to be considered a success for Borussia Dortmund.
The transition from long-time head coach Jurgen Klopp to Thomas Tuchel went better than anyone would've dared to hope, as the club firmly re-established itself as the second force in German football.
Seventy-eight points in the league, a new record for runners-up, was overshadowed by an inexplicable collapse against Liverpool in the UEFA Europa League quarter-finals and a fourth-straight defeat in the DFB-Pokal against Bayern Munich, however.
Apart from the obvious takeaways—Dortmund were very good but not quite good enough this season—onlookers learned a number of things about the Black and Yellows over the course of the campaign.
Here, Bleacher Report presents five of those.
Henrikh Mkhitaryan Is the Club's Best Player
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Dortmund fans have enjoyed a fair few spectacular performances in the 2015/16 campaign.
Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang couldn't stop scoring in the first half of the season, hitting the net 27 times before the turn of the year, per Transfermarkt.co.uk. Julian Weigl's first year in the top flight was remarkably consistent a high level, while Mats Hummels' second half of the season was world class.
They all pale in comparison to the club's best player, though. Indubitably, that is Henrikh Mkhitaryan.
The Armenian started well, a hat-trick in the Europa League qualifiers against Wolfsberg announcing his intentions as early as August. Scoring 23 and assisting a whopping 32 goals in 52 matches across all competitions, per Transfermarkt, the 27-year-old was simply unstoppable.
Mkhitaryan was the Bundesliga's player of the season per a vote by his peers in sport magazine Kicker (link in German), and who are we to disagree?
Dortmund's Defence Was Not Championship-Worthy
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As the old saying goes, defence wins championships. Sporting cliche or not, the 2015/16 season proved it isn't complete nonsense.
Dortmund scored a club-record 82 goals in the Bundesliga and put four past Liverpool across the two Europa League quarter-final legs. They could easily have been enough to win a title and make it to the semi-finals, respectively.
However, the Black and Yellows' defence wasn't up to par. The Ruhr side trailed Bayern by eight points at the conclusion of the first half of the campaign, having conceded 23 goals in 17 league matches, including five in the meeting in Bavaria.
Shoring their defence up after the turn of the year, Dortmund conceded only 11 goals in the Ruckrunde, as the second half of the season is called in Germany. That was only two more than Bayern, and Pep Guardiola's side won only two points more than Tuchel's as a result.
Dortmund didn't solve all of their defensive problems, however, as the heartbreaking defeat on Merseyside showed.
The Kids Are Alright
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The emergence of young players is among the most enjoyable things to watch for fans. They get a glimpse at a promising future, while dreams are coming true for the talented kids.
In Christian Pulisic and Felix Passlack, Dortmund fans welcomed two highly rated academy products to the senior team in the 2015/16 campaign. Both only 17 years of age, the pair made the jump from the under-19s to the senior squad during the winter break and quickly debuted in the Bundesliga.
Pulisic's performances were especially promising, as he scored twice in his 12 matches for Tuchel's side, making him the youngest player in Bundesliga history to accomplish that feat, per ESPN FC's Stephan Uersfeld. His meteoric rise this season culminated in a call-up for the United States' Copa America Centenario squad.
Passlack, who was born in the Ruhr area, might not have generated the buzz his team-mate did, but he held his own while playing in a number of different roles for the first team. He displayed an impressive versatility that'll do him well in the years to come.
Dortmund's youth movement won't end anytime soon, with the club having already signed 19-year-olds Mikel Merino from Osasuna and Ousmane Dembele from Rennes for next season.
Sven Bender Is a Centre-Back
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Sven Bender looked like one of a small number of players who didn't benefit from the coaching change.
With him not being a great fit for Tuchel's playing style due to his lack of technical and strategical qualities in defensive midfield, the 27-year-old didn't have a big role during the first months of the season.
Per Transfermarkt, he spent a grand total of 185 minutes on the pitch on the first 13 Bundesliga matchdays, only once getting a full 90-minute appearance in the 5-1 loss against Bayern. In that game, he played at centre-back for the first time under Tuchel.
Even though it didn't work too well at the Allianz Arena, Bender slowly but steadily won a spot in central defence, where he was a regular for much of the second half of the season, at times being preferred to Sokratis Papastathopoulos.
Bender's performances at the heart of defence were good enough to earn him a contract extension until 2021 in February. Sporting director Michael Zorc said at the time, per the club's official website: "Sven plays with intransigency and exemplary fairness. For many years he has been a valuable asset to our team, as a player and a man!"
Those qualities will serve the former Germany international well, but he'll likely get to show them at centre-back only as long as Tuchel is in charge of Dortmund.
Fans Can Trust Thomas Tuchel with the Rebuild
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With Dortmund having lost Hummels to Bayern and it looking increasingly likely that Ilkay Gundogan will leave for Manchester City in the summer, per James Ducker of the Telegraph, the Black and Yellows are heading for a busy summer.
Head coach Thomas Tuchel even used the word "rebuild" when asked about next season after the cup final loss against Bayern, per YellowWallPod.com's Luca Gierl.
While it's always scary to lose key players, especially for Dortmund, who struggled to immediately replace players such as Robert Lewandowski in recent years, fans can trust Tuchel to keep the boat steady next season.
The 42-year-old answered almost every question in his first year in charge at the Westfalenstadion, with the team quickly adapting to his idea of playing football. Tuchel clearly is the right man for the job.
Lars Pollmann is a Featured Columnist writing on Borussia Dortmund. He also writes for YellowWallPod.com. You can follow him on Twitter.
