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Against a backdrop of sleet, snow, and a swirling breeze from the waters of the Humber Estuary, combined with a determined Hull City side pushing hard for a top-flight place, this presented all the makings of a challenging night's work for Chelsea.

"We could have added to our tally but Hull are a good team and it was a tough tie; I’m delighted with the performance," the manager stated. "This club means a lot to me so it was nice to get a good reception from both sets of supporters. The application of the lads was excellent."

The Rosenior holds this city dear to him, considering some of his family hail from Hull and his enjoyable spell in management of the Championship club. This positive connection was extended with a magnificent performance from his team, who ultimately sauntered into the next round of the famous old competition.

Clinical Edge Secures Comfortable Victory

Three days removed from letting slip a 2-0 advantage in the league, there was a hint of vulnerability about Chelsea going into this intriguing tie. The capacity home crowd clearly sensed it too, but Rosenior's men navigated the task perfectly.

Rosenior rang the changes, making multiple of them to his starting lineup. The match might and perhaps ought to have been decided earlier than it eventually was, with both Estêvão Willian and Liam Delap at fault for spurning glorious chances to put their side in front in the opening period.

But, fortunately for the visitors, their Portuguese attacker was in a far more clinical frame of mind. He opened the scoring with a spectacular distance strike, which proved to be the spark for his team to take command of proceedings. By full time, they had four, with the forward scoring a trio of them for a superb three-goal haul.

The Forward's Redemption and Influence

Hull displayed great spirit all game, but the better chances always came to the visitors. The winger ought to have opened the scoring when he rounded goalkeeper Dillon Phillips before unbelievably shooting over. The striker then had a similar horror incident in front of goal against his old team.

He blocked a the goalkeeper's clearance which came back from the crossbar, and Delap began to run away believing the ball had crossed the line. It had not, and by the time he realised, Hull's defenders had responded to avert the threat.

The player had his head in his hands after that miss, but he was immensely instrumental from there on out, providing three assists. The opening was for the first goal as his through ball set up Neto to score from outside the box. Shortly after the restart, it was 2-0 as Neto's corner went directly in through the keeper's legs.

Tie Sealed and Focus Shifts

Soon after Neto’s second goal, the tie was put beyond doubt as a dazzling dribble from Delap laid on Estêvão to tap into an empty net. The hat-trick hero then finished his hat-trick as Delap once again played the decisive ball for the attacker to calmly slot past a stranded goalkeeper.

By that stage, the effort Hull had done in the first thirty minutes had been forgotten. Their priority must now return to securing a promotion to the top division under their manager, who rested 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 matches this can be a good example of how we must play."

Hull showed great effort to the final whistle, and they almost got a late goal when a substitute hit a post in injury time. But this was Chelsea’s night, and another encouraging step forward for their recently-appointed head coach at a stadium he is familiar with very well.

FA Cup History Look Good

That resulted in an in the end routine night's performance, and the cup competition omens are positive from here for Chelsea. They have played Hull on three previous times in this tournament in the last decade and on each occasion, they have progressed to reach the showpiece. There is remains to be work in that respect, but this was another significant positive for Rosenior.