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Amid sleet, flurries, and a biting wind off the waters of the Humber, combined with a resolute Hull City side fighting for a top-flight place, this presented all the ingredients of a challenging night's work for Chelsea.

"We might have scored more but Hull are a good team and it was a difficult tie; I’m delighted with the display," he said. "Hull City means a lot to me so it was great to get a good welcome from the fans of supporters. The application of the lads was superb."

Liam Chelsea manager has this city close to his heart, given part of his relatives are from Hull and his successful spell in charge of the Championship club. His happy association continued with a magnificent performance from his team, who ultimately sauntered into the fifth round of the FA Cup.

Deadly Edge Secures Comfortable Victory

Seventy-two hours after surrendering a two-goal lead in the Premier League, there was a sniff of fragility about them going into this intriguing tie. The capacity home support clearly felt it too, but the London side navigated the challenge perfectly.

The manager made alterations, enacting multiple of them to his XI. The tie could and perhaps should have been decided earlier than it actually was, with two the Brazilian winger and the forward guilty of missing excellent chances to put Chelsea in front in the first half.

But, fortunately for the away team, Pedro Neto was in a far more ruthless frame of mind. He broke the scoring with a marvellous long-range strike, which acted as the spark for Chelsea to take command of proceedings. By the final whistle, they had four, with the forward netting a trio of them for a superb hat-trick.

The Forward's Response and Impact

The home side showed plenty of fight all game, but the better chances consistently came to the visitors. The winger ought to have broken the scoring when he rounded keeper the Hull stopper before unbelievably shooting over. The striker then had a comparable nightmare incident in front of goal against his old team.

He deflected a the goalkeeper's clearance which bounced off the crossbar, and he began to celebrate believing the ball had crossed the line. It hadn’t, and by the time he understood, Hull's defenders had reacted to clear the danger.

The player had his head in his hands after that moment, but he was immensely influential from that point onward, providing three assists. The first was for the opening goal as his pass teed up his teammate to score from outside the box. Shortly after the restart, it was 2-0 as the forward's corner went directly in under the keeper's legs.

Tie Put Beyond Doubt and Attention Shifts

Soon after the second goal, the tie was effectively ended as a dazzling dribble from the forward teed up his teammate to tap into an empty net. Neto then completed his hat-trick as Delap again played the crucial pass for the attacker to calmly slot past a helpless Phillips.

By that stage, the work Hull had done in the opening half-hour had long since forgotten. Their focus must now switch back to securing a promotion to the top division under Sergej Jakirovic, who left out several key individuals with that goal in mind.

"In my opinion we deserved at least one goal but if we play like this we will be in a very good position in the league," he said. "Keep fighting, maybe in the next games this can be a good lesson of how we should play."

There was great effort to the final whistle, and they nearly got a consolation when Lewis Koumas hit a post in injury time. But this was Chelsea’s night, and another positive step forward for their new manager at a place he is familiar with very well.

FA Cup History Look Promising

That resulted in an in the end routine night's performance, and the FA Cup-shaped signs are good from here for Chelsea. They have played Hull on three other occasions in this tournament in the past ten years and every single time, they have gone on to reach the showpiece. There is still work in that respect, but this was another huge tick for Rosenior.