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Against a backdrop of sleet, flurries, and a biting wind from the banks of the Humber Estuary, alongside a resolute Hull City side pushing hard for promotion, this had all the ingredients of a challenging evening’s work 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," the manager stated. "Hull City is very special to me so it was nice to get a good reception from both sets of supporters. The attitude of the lads was superb."

The Rosenior has this city close to his heart, given part of his family hail from Hull and his enjoyable period in charge of the Championship club. This positive association was extended with a commanding performance from his team, who in the end sauntered into the next round of the famous old competition.

Clinical Edge Seals Comfortable Win

Three days removed from surrendering a 2-0 advantage in the league, there was a sniff of vulnerability about Chelsea going into this potentially tricky cup clash. The packed Hull support clearly felt it too, but the London side navigated the task perfectly.

Rosenior made alterations, making multiple of them to his XI. The tie might and maybe ought to have been settled earlier than it actually was, with both Estêvão Willian and the forward at fault for missing excellent opportunities to put Chelsea in front in the first half.

But, luckily for the visitors, Pedro Neto was in a much more ruthless frame of mind. He opened the scoring with a spectacular long-range effort, which proved to be the spark for Chelsea to assume command of proceedings. By full time, they had 4 goals, with the forward netting three of them for a superb hat-trick.

Delap's Response and Influence

Hull showed plenty of fight throughout, but the better chances always fell to the visitors. Estêvão ought to have opened the deadlock when he rounded keeper the Hull stopper before unbelievably shooting over. The striker then had a comparable horror incident in front of goal against his old team.

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

Delap had his head in his hands after that miss, but he was immensely instrumental from there on out, registering 3 key passes. The first was for the opening goal as his pass set up Neto to finish from outside the box. Shortly after the second half began, it was 2-0 as the forward's corner went straight in through the keeper's legs.

Contest Put Beyond Doubt and Focus Shifts

Soon after the second goal, the match was effectively ended as a magnificent run from Delap teed up Estêvão to tap into an unguarded goal. Neto then completed his hat-trick as Delap once again played the decisive ball for the striker to calmly convert by a stranded goalkeeper.

At that point, the work Hull had done in the opening thirty minutes had long since erased. Their priority must now switch back to achieving a promotion to the Premier League under Sergej Jakirovic, who left out several key players with that aim in mind.

"In my opinion we earned at least one goal but if we play like this we will be in a very good position in the Championship," the Hull manager commented. "Keep fighting, maybe in the next matches this can be a good lesson of how we should play."

Hull showed great endeavour to the end, and they nearly got a late goal when a substitute struck a the upright in stoppage time. But this was the Blues' night, and another positive stride for their recently-appointed manager at a stadium he is familiar with very well.

Cup Omens Look Promising

That resulted in an ultimately straightforward evening’s work, and the FA Cup-shaped signs are positive from here for the winners. They have faced Hull on three previous occasions in this competition in the last decade and every single time, they have gone on to reach the showpiece. Much remains to be work in that respect, but this was another significant positive for Rosenior.