You'd reason to believe that a post detailing the "Top 10 Most Disappointing Wines of Bordeaux 2013" would be a bit severe, but the rundown of the wines in The Drinks Business is devoid of much vitriol. Criticism of the vintage, culled from wine merchants surveyed by Liv-ex, runs the gamut from “skeletal” and “rasping” to “charming” and “pleasant”. Not that the latter two descriptors mean record prices, but it's certainly not a disaster.
Négociant Ben Kennedy called the 8th worst wine, Ducru-Beaucaillou, his "wine of the day". (Maybe it was the best of a very bad day?). Contrast that with Guy Seddon of Corney & Barrow whose mild assessment pronounced it a wine that “...didn’t set the pulse racing”. Kennedy, while noting its strengths, did say he found it difficult to “engage” with, that it lacked intensity “...and tapers to a dry-tannin finish”.
Is this a universally panned vintage or one that will prove to be divisive? And how much does price have to go down before the opinion of the vintage starts to rise?
