Identity & place
What this club is really about
Chelsea make most sense when the contradictions are left intact. The club carries the name of fashionable Chelsea but plays just over the boundary in Fulham; the stadium existed before the football club; a 1960s image of flair, music and King’s Road style sits beside a tougher terrace tradition; supporters who later watched an era of huge trophies also remember a time when the club nearly dropped into the third tier and almost lost its home. The Shed supplied much of the language, 1980s survival supplied the stubbornness, and the modern trophy years supplied a belief that no European occasion is too large.