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Loïc Badé

JonnoSnr

Viv Anderson
I still think playing Steve Cook over Bade sums up a lot of our PL issues under Cooper.

Madness.
Nothing more than speculation on my part but I wonder if Cooper was digging his heels in here and being stubborn. He'd had to practically beg Dane Murphy to sanction the Steve Cook signing and Bade was one of those last minute deadline day signings who I imagine Cooper knew little about.
 

GOBIAS

Ian Bowyer
Nothing more than speculation on my part but I wonder if Cooper was digging his heels in here and being stubborn. He'd had to practically beg Dane Murphy to sanction the Steve Cook signing and Bade was one of those last minute deadline day signings who I imagine Cooper knew little about.
At the end of the day we stayed up. Big Willy Boly and Felipe played a huge part in that.
 

Statto

Free Kick Specialist
Probably the wrong time for him.

At first despite us bringing in players like Boly, Cooper started with the players he trusted who had got us here, which is perhaps quite sensible when there are a lot of new players who don't know each other well and need time to settle.

Then when he did move away a bit from the promotion winning CBs it was for experienced players like Boly and Felipe because it was clear having top level experience was going to help keep us up.

There wasn't a lot of room for players like Bade and Biancone (though he was injured too) especially with Bade only being on loan.

Suspect if they'd come in the year after we would have used them more.
 

Gyros Peter

Sauce salad?
What I do find interesting about Bade and Cooper, is how quick to use Murillo Coops was the season after. Makes you wonder if here was more to it than just inexperience, though I suspect that Murillo just looked _that_ good upon arrival that Coops couldn't ignore him. Interesting to ponder but doubt we'll ever know.
 

Baronvon

Jack Burkitt
I really do think it was a case that Murillo was simply THAT good.

It'll be a sad day when he eventually moves on, but he's got everything he needs to go onto have an amazing career.

Plus we'll make an absolute fortune.
 

youreds1986

Jack Armstrong
What I do find interesting about Bade and Cooper, is how quick to use Murillo Coops was the season after. Makes you wonder if here was more to it than just inexperience, though I suspect that Murillo just looked _that_ good upon arrival that Coops couldn't ignore him. Interesting to ponder but doubt we'll ever know.
Exactly.

Either Cooper entirely misjudged Bade as a player, or there’s something underlying which was the issue.

Everyone with any footballing brain could see that two of our major problems were pace at the back (forcing us deeper and deeper) and ability to retain possession/build play (another strength of Bade).
 

marshal99

John Robertson
i remember bade couldn't speak english so cooper has problem with communication , unlike the brazilian lads, they had scarpa there who can speak english well and help as their translator.
 

Statto

Free Kick Specialist
i remember bade couldn't speak english so cooper has problem with communication , unlike the brazilian lads, they had scarpa there who can speak english well and help as their translator.
Scarpa didn't sign for us until the start of January though, unless he had arrived sooner because of the timings of the league ending and was already around the team. I think also, we didn't sign Felipe and Danilo until the same window, so we didn't actually have any Brazilians until then other than Lodi, but we did have Boly who could speak Portuguese as he played there and also Cafu who was Portuguese, this is probably the reason the initial lads settled. I think Scarpa had to go back to Brazil for a bit to sort out the crypto issues and then didn't really have a place in the side to come back to after that. So I think he had enough issues of his own to sort without looking after Danilo and Felipe.

Bade is French, whilst it's possible that he couldn't speak English or didn't have good enough English to get by, they would have known this presumably when making the signing.

Also, we had
Niakhate, Boly, Biancone (and later Ayew) who were born in France
Aurier, Kouyate from a French-speaking country
Freuler, Mangala from countries where French is one of several official languages
Dennis played in Belgium also before joining Watford
Cafu played in France for Lorient and Metz
Navas (who came in later) was on loan from a French club
so plenty of colleagues who could speak the language and help out if required.

It's a nice theory, but probably not as likely as that he simply didn't settle (or want to learn English to do so) and that the club simply didn't pursue the loan for another reason. It's likely to be common that a young player simply doesn't settle in a foreign country and we were hardly a settled side at the time either with all the new players. It was probably a low-risk scatter gun that they fired at a player who looked good potential wise, but just didn't have the chance to deliver. Like Biancone who got injured and then when he was back the club had moved on past needing promising players and needed top level experience.
 

Captain Sinister

Senior doom Monger
Bade joined on loan with an option to buy.
He returned to his contracted club 2 years ago.
I saw Bade in pre-season friendlies but he never made an appearance for the 1st team in the league.
The friendly games were inconclusive - he didn't shine, and did make a few errors.
I think Cooper simply didn't want to risk relying on him in the Premier League, and Forest didn't take up the option to buy.
People raving about his performances for Sevilla seem to be forgetting: he is now 2-years older, and also Sevilla during Bade's time with them have finished an unspectacular 12th and 14th in La Liga.
I think bringing him to a top Premier League club is going to be a gamble.
His career trajectory seems to resemble Adehamzic (Sp), who has been tipped for great things (mainly by his Dad), but has never delivered.
I think it is only with the benefit of hindsight people are saying Forest missed a diamond geezer.
 
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JonnoSnr

Viv Anderson
Mental that he couldn't get a game over Worrall or Steve Cook.

Would love to know the real reason behind it as that 'language' stuff is clearly nonsense considering we almost had the entire UN represented in the squad that season.
 

Chappers85

Can't Play Left-Back
Mental that he couldn't get a game over Worrall or Steve Cook.

Would love to know the real reason behind it as that 'language' stuff is clearly nonsense considering we almost had the entire UN represented in the squad that season.
I doubt it was a language thing, and for all I know maybe the lad had a bad attitude, but I suspect just that he was a young centre back that was on loan that Cooper didn't know very well so didn't trust him. Cooper was finding his feet in the Prem, and Worrall, McKenna and Cook were the players that got us promoted so despite their limitations knew they would go out and give everything and follow instructions when we were so backs to the wall (which we usually were). The rest of the team were a bunch of strangers so that was probably was a little bit of continuity.
 
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