High Sierra / BootCamp / USB installer?

Hello,

I'm trying to setup a dual boot via bootcamp to have Windows 7.

Macbook Pro 2011 / OSX 10.13.6 High Sierra

I followed the steps in the link below:

https://support.apple.com/en-gb/guide/bootcamp-assistant/bcmp09f5f773/6.1/mac/10.13

However, I never reach step 5, as I get an error such as: "the installer could not be found".

What I did:

1. Formatted my 32GB USB stick via Disk Utility to ExFAT
2. Using BootCamp, I downloaded and saved the files onto the USB stick.
3. BootCamp fails to find the Win7 ISO image
4. I copied the contents of the ISO image into the USB stick via Terminal.
5. Tried again to find the installer via BootCamp, but it keeps failing.

I realised that BootCamp is expecting the installer to be only on an optical media such-as CD/DVD.

However, I do not have any CD/DVDs at hand, so what are my options to make this work properly?

-Some virtual optical media that will mount the ISO and present it as an actual CD/DVD to bootcamp?

-Some guide to manually, and safely partition my current HDD without BootCamp?

-Could it be that ExFAT is the problem? should I try MS-DOS?

-What if I format the USB to MS-DOS, copy the ISO content onto it (without windows support tools), then will bootcamp find the installer?

Can't think of other possible workarounds, please help.

Thanks,

Joe