Ranking Borussia Dortmund's Top 5 Players for 2016

The end of 2016 is upon us. What better time could there be to reflect on the past 12 months?

For Borussia Dortmund, it was a difficult year. After a promising first half of the 2015/16 season under first-year head coach Thomas Tuchel, few would have predicted such a bumpy 2016.

The Black and Yellows failed to win silverware, dropping out of the Europa League in heartbreaking fashion against Liverpool in the quarter-finals and losing in the DFB-Pokal final to heated rivals Bayern Munich.

To make matters worse, the Ruhr side lost three of their best and most important players to clubs with bigger financial firepower, with Mats Hummels, Ilkay Gundogan and Henrikh Mkhitaryan joining Bayern, Manchester City and Manchester United, respectively.

Replacing players of such quality and standing would always take time, but even the most ardent supporter would agree that Dortmund's up-and-down first half of the current campaign has been a bit of a disappointment.

Nonetheless, the millions of fans of this special club have seen some excellent performances from their team throughout 2016, as well as spectacular individual showings.

Here, Bleacher Report takes a look at the five best Dortmund players over the last 12 months.

Note that only those who spent the entire year with the club will be considered and that we assessed the performance of the eight summer signings in an earlier piece.

Dortmund fans received an early Christmas gift when the club announced minutes before the final game of the calendar year, against FC Augsburg, that Julian Weigl had signed a contract extension designed to keep him at Westfalenstadion until 2021.

He earned the upgraded deal—including, one can presume, a bumper pay rise—with excellent performances since joining the club from 1860 Munich for a mere €2.5 million in the summer of 2015.

Nobody could have foreseen the then-teenager would become a regular starter in his first season, let alone one of the team's best players. That is what happened, though, earning Weigl a trip to Euro 2016 with Germany and widespread praise.

Raphael Honigstein called him the best signing of the 2015/16 campaign in a piece for ESPN FC, opining that "no other club in Europe's top five leagues will have done a better deal than Dortmund."

Weigl has continued to play at a high level in the first half of this season, albeit perhaps not quite meeting the standards he set for himself earlier in the year. Clearly, the Germany international suffers from losing his partner in central midfield in Gundogan.

Regardless, he remains one of the most consistent players for the Black and Yellows, showing a maturity that makes it easy to forget he is only 21 years old and "is still at the beginning of his sporting development," as sporting director Michael Zorc said in the announcement of Weigl's contract extension.

Another player in his second season with the club, it took Roman Burki more time to get acclimated at Westfalenstadion than Weigl.

The goalkeeper struggled with the move from SC Freiburg to Dortmund and the stark contrast in playing style that comes with a switch from a perennial relegation candidate to a club with European ambitions.

Burki overcame those problems during his first few months in the Ruhr valley in 2016, however, developing "as a person, as a character, as a goalkeeper and as a player," as Tuchel put it in a press conference after a 5-1 win over VfL Wolfsburg in September.

The 26-year-old was the best player on the pitch that day, the scoreline notwithstanding. Without his brilliant performance, it could easily have been a 5-5 or even a defeat for Dortmund. It showed the predicament 'keepers on good teams can find themselves in; the credit will always go to the attacking players.

Still, Burki developed into a bona fide No. 1 goalkeeper for the Black and Yellows in 2016, eliminating mistakes from his game and gaining the kind of confidence that men between the sticks need.

Perhaps it took an injury to the Switzerland international for people to realise how strong he has become, with back-up Roman Weidenfeller failing to keep a single clean sheet for a Dortmund side that has won only two of seven matches since Burki broke his hand in the Bundesliga victory over Bayern in November.

His return will go a long way toward solidifying a defence that has looked suspect in the first half of the season, as Burki kept an impressive 16 clean sheets in 36 matches over the last 12 months.

At first glance, including Marco Reus on a list of Dortmund's five best players for 2016 may seem odd. After all, the Germany international missed almost half of the year with muscle problems that also cost him a spot at the Euros in France in the summer.

However, the 27-year-old played at a high level when available, both in the second half of last season and in his few appearances after returning from injury this term.

Despite still having to wait for his first major trophy, Reus is a big-game player, as evidenced by his scoring record in 2016.

Of his 14 goals during the calendar year, he scored three in this year's Champions League group stage, four in the knockout stages of the Europa League last season and two in the DFB-Pokal to get Dortmund to the final.

The absence of perhaps the team's biggest star has almost been overlooked when analysts dissected Dortmund's up-and-down performances this campaign, as argued in an earlier piece. His strong showings since returning from a 185-day injury layoff late in the year only reinforce that view.

Reus is a true difference-maker and a genuine superstar, only held back by his inability to stay fit. In that regard, 2016 was almost a perfect reflection of his career so far.

In the absence of important figures such as ex-team captain Hummels, the onus was on others to step up just as much as it was on new signings to bring a spark to their new team. More than anyone else, Sokratis Papastathopoulos took that to heart.

The Greek defender has arguably been Dortmund's best player this season, developing into the clear leader of a back line that has suffered from both Hummels' defection to Bavaria and a lack of continuity because of injuries and form crises.

Sokratis is the team's bastion of calm when the going gets tough, living up to his nickname Papa. Taking the more inexperienced centre-backs, such as Matthias Ginter and Marc Bartra, under his wing, he displays positive body language, encourages team-mates and animates his side from the back.

A deputy for captain Marcel Schmelzer, the 28-year-old's new status as one of the indispensable leaders of the team came as a bit of a surprise given he sometimes found himself on the bench under Tuchel, who seemingly preferred converted midfielder Sven Bender at the heart of defence.

However, Sokratis fought his way into the team with spirited yet disciplined performances, playing especially well in some of the more important games. He was arguably the best man on the pitch in the cup final—making his miss in the shootout all the more tragic—and has generally been the Ruhr side's only consistent defender throughout the last 12 months.

ESPN FC's Stefan Buczko praised him in a review of Dortmund's first half of the season: "In a back line that has played 23 different combinations during the first half of the season, Sokratis' resolute defending has prevented what could have been a full-blown crisis."

Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang topped our ranking for 2015. Once again, he was the logical winner for the past 12 months.

Scoring 32 goals in 44 matches across competitions, the Gabonese remains one of the deadliest strikers in Europe despite not quite reaching his impressive numbers from 2015.

Given the fact he was robbed of two of his best assistants in Gundogan and Mkhitaryan, as well as Reus for large stretches, his strong first half of this season more than offsets a perhaps somewhat disappointing start to the year, when he uncharacteristically missed a large number of chances and generally did not look himself.

"His blinding pace gives his team a natural advantage at times, but not as often as one would think," Buczko noted. "As the 27-year-old is more clinical as a poacher in the box than running toward goal with only the 'keeper to beat."

Indeed, Aubameyang has scored almost all of his goals in 2016 from inside the box, showing his excellent situational awareness and impeccable finishing technique. For him, scoring sometimes looks easy.

Africa's reigning footballer of the year, he will lead host nation Gabon at the Africa Cup of Nations in January 2017, and Dortmund will miss him dearly.

With never-ending rumours linking him with Real Madrid, Manchester City and most of the super-rich clubs of Europe, as noted by ESPN FC's Stephan Uersfeld among others, it may well be a first taste of life without Aubameyang for the Black and Yellows. Their fans will enjoy having him around for as long as they can.

The 27-year-old is a force of nature.

Performance data according to Transfermarkt.

Lars Pollmann also writes for The Yellow Wall. You can follow him on Twitter.