Michel Bettane and Thierry Desseauve: Great colour and impressive substance, showing generous but not aggressive tannins and ideally ripe fruit with a lovely follow-through. The craftsmanship is very precise, aiming to produce a young wine in a softer, more approachable style than in recent years – a natural and long-awaited development. 17

Michael Schuster: fine, complex, scented, mineral nose. Rich, generous, fresh and finely tannic wine – a lovely balance, with the fruit always to the fore. Ripe, fleshy, blackcurrant Cabernet flavour, Médoc gravel-infused, with real complexity and excellent aromatic length. Classy, seductive, harmonious expression of Pauillac. An excellent follow-on to the fine 2003. 16.5/17