Andrew Jefford: Deep, dark, and dense. Sweet, plush, and resonant, with some secondary complexities already, though you can still smell the cool restraint of the vintage. Plum, elder, and sedge scents. Lots of efforts have gone into the palate, and there is ample fruit and concentration, but this is unquestionably a difficult vintage in Pessac- Léognan and the fruit lacks nobility. It’s a bit simple. Good-quality tannins, however, will give the wine some legs. Now to 2019. 85

Michael Schuster: Dense ripe fruit on the nose; medium-full, but concentrated for the year, tasty, tannic, plenty of flavor, some length across the palate, too; quite chewy for the fruit that is there, but satisfying if not particularly fine or complex. 2020–28. 88