One criticised about nothing becomes cut off (8)
I believe the answer is:
isolated
'cut off' is the definition.
(thesaurus)
'one criticised about nothing' is the wordplay.
'one' becomes 'i' (Roman numeral).
'criticised' becomes 'slated' (I've seen this before).
'about' indicates putting letters inside.
'nothing' becomes 'o' (looks like zero - 0).
'slated' placed around 'o' is 'solated'.
'i'+'solated'='ISOLATED'
'becomes' is the link.
(Other definitions for isolated that I've seen before include "hard to find" , "Cut off or left behind" , "Off the beaten track" , "(Left) on one's own" , "individual" .)