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Against a backdrop of freezing rain, snow, and a biting wind from the banks of the Humber, alongside a resolute Hull City side pushing hard for a top-flight place, this presented all the makings of a difficult evening’s task for Chelsea.

"We might have scored more but Hull are a strong team and it was a difficult tie; I’m very pleased with the display," he said. "Hull City is very special to me so it was nice to get a positive welcome from the fans of fans. The attitude of the lads was superb."

The Chelsea manager has this city close to his heart, given part of his relatives are from Hull and his enjoyable period in management of the Tigers. This happy connection was extended with a magnificent display from his team, who in the end strolled into the fifth round of the famous old competition.

Clinical Edge Secures Comfortable Victory

Three days removed from surrendering a two-goal advantage in the league, there was a sniff of fragility about them going into this potentially tricky tie. The packed home support evidently felt it too, but Rosenior's men navigated the task with ease.

Rosenior made alterations, enacting seven of them to his XI. The tie might and maybe should have been decided long before it actually was, with both Estêvão Willian and the forward guilty of spurning excellent opportunities to put Chelsea ahead in the opening period.

But, luckily for the away team, Pedro Neto was in a far more ruthless mood. He broke the deadlock with a spectacular distance effort, which proved to be the spark for his team to assume command of proceedings. By full time, they had four, with the forward scoring a trio of them for a brilliant three-goal haul.

The Forward's Redemption and Impact

Hull showed plenty of fight all game, but the clearer opportunities always came to the visitors. The winger ought to have opened the deadlock when he went past goalkeeper the Hull stopper before inexplicably firing over. Delap then had a comparable horror incident in front of goal against his former club.

He blocked a Phillips's kick which came back from the crossbar, and he started to celebrate believing the ball had gone over the line. It hadn’t, and by the time he understood, Hull's defenders had reacted to avert the danger.

Delap 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 first goal as his pass set up Neto to finish from range. Six minutes after the second half began, it was two as Neto's set-piece went directly in under Phillips's legs.

Tie Put Beyond Doubt and Attention Turns

Soon after the second, the tie was put beyond doubt as a dazzling run from Delap teed up Estêvão to slide into an empty net. Neto then finished his hat-trick as Delap again played the decisive pass for the striker to calmly slot by a helpless Phillips.

At that point, the effort Hull had put in in the first half-hour had been erased. Their focus must now return to achieving a return to the Premier League under Sergej Jakirovic, who left out several first-choice individuals with that goal in mind.

"I think we deserved at least one goal but if we perform like this we will be in a very good situation in the league," the Hull manager commented. "Keep fighting, maybe in the upcoming games this can be a positive lesson of how we should play."

There was great endeavour to the end, and they nearly got a consolation when a substitute struck a the upright in injury time. But this was Chelsea’s night, and another positive stride for their recently-appointed head coach at a place he is familiar with intimately.

FA Cup History Are Good

The result resulted in an ultimately straightforward evening’s performance, and the cup competition omens are good from here for the winners. They have played Hull on three other times in this tournament in the past ten years and on each occasion, they have gone on to reach the final. Much still work in that respect, but this was another significant tick for Rosenior.