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Amid freezing rain, snow, and a biting breeze from the banks of the Humber, alongside a resolute home side pushing hard for a top-flight place, this presented all the ingredients of a difficult night's work for the visitors.

"We could have added to our tally but the opposition are a good team and it was a tough fixture; I am delighted with the performance," the manager stated. "This club is very special to me so it was great to get a positive welcome from the fans of supporters. The attitude of the lads was excellent."

Liam Rosenior holds this place dear to him, given some of his relatives hail from Hull and his successful period in charge of the Championship club. His positive association was extended with a commanding performance from his squad, who ultimately strolled into the fifth round of the famous old competition.

Clinical Edge Secures Comfortable Victory

Seventy-two hours removed from surrendering a 2-0 advantage in the league, there was a sniff of vulnerability about Chelsea going into this intriguing cup clash. The capacity home crowd clearly sensed it too, but the London side handled the task with ease.

Rosenior rang the changes, making seven of them to his XI. The match could and perhaps should have been settled earlier than it actually was, with both Estêvão Willian and Liam Delap guilty of spurning excellent chances to put their side in front in the first half.

However, luckily for the visitors, Pedro Neto was in a much more ruthless mood. He opened the scoring with a spectacular distance effort, which proved to be the spark for his team to assume command of proceedings. By the final whistle, they had 4 goals, with Neto scoring three of them for a brilliant three-goal haul.

The Forward's Response and Impact

Hull showed plenty of spirit all game, but the better chances consistently fell Chelsea’s way. The winger ought to have broken the deadlock when he rounded goalkeeper Dillon Phillips before unbelievably shooting over. The striker then had a similar horror moment in front of goal against his old team.

He blocked a the goalkeeper's kick which bounced back from the crossbar, and Delap began to celebrate thinking the ball had crossed the line. It hadn’t, and by the time he realised, Hull's backline had responded to avert the threat.

Delap had his head in his hands after that moment, but he was immensely influential from that point onward, providing 3 key passes. The opening was for the opening goal as his pass teed up Neto to score from outside the box. Shortly after the second half began, it was two as the forward's set-piece went directly in through the keeper's legs.

Contest Put Beyond Doubt and Attention Turns

Seven minutes after the second goal, the match was put beyond doubt as a dazzling run from Delap laid on his teammate to slide into an empty net. The hat-trick hero then completed his hat-trick as the provider once again delivered the crucial pass for the attacker to coolly convert past a helpless goalkeeper.

At that point, the effort Hull had put in in the opening thirty minutes had been forgotten. Their focus must now return to securing a promotion to the Premier League under their manager, who left out a number of key 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 position in the Championship," the Hull manager commented. "Never surrender, maybe in the next games this can be a positive lesson of how we must play."

There was great endeavour to the end, and they almost got a late goal when a substitute struck a post in stoppage time. But this was Chelsea’s night, and another positive step forward for their new head coach at a stadium he is familiar with intimately.

Cup History Look Good

That made for an in the end routine night's work, and the FA Cup-shaped signs are good from here for the winners. They have faced Hull on three other occasions in this tournament in the last decade and every single time, they have progressed to make the final. Much remains to be done in that regard, but this was another significant positive for Rosenior.