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Against a backdrop of sleet, snow, and a swirling wind from the waters of the Humber, alongside a resolute Hull City side fighting for a top-flight place, this had all the makings of a difficult evening’s work for the visitors.

"We could have scored more but the opposition are a strong team and it was a difficult tie; I’m very pleased with the display," the manager stated. "Hull City means a lot to me so it was nice to get a positive reception from both sets of supporters. The application of the lads was excellent."

The Rosenior has this city dear to him, given some of his relatives hail from Hull and his successful spell in management of the Championship club. This happy connection continued with a commanding performance from his team, who ultimately sauntered into the fifth round of the FA Cup.

Deadly Edge Secures Comfortable Win

Seventy-two hours after surrendering a two-goal advantage in the league, there was a sniff of fragility about Chelsea going into this intriguing cup clash. The packed Hull support clearly sensed it too, but the London side handled the challenge with ease.

Rosenior rang the changes, enacting seven of them to his starting lineup. The match could and maybe should have been decided earlier than it eventually 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, their Portuguese attacker was in a far more ruthless mood. He opened the scoring with a spectacular distance effort, which acted as the catalyst for his team to take command of proceedings. By the final whistle, they had four, with Neto scoring a trio of them for a brilliant three-goal haul.

The Forward's Redemption and Impact

Hull displayed plenty of fight all game, but the clearer opportunities consistently came to the visitors. The winger should have broken the deadlock when he rounded keeper the Hull stopper before inexplicably shooting over. Delap then had a comparable horror incident in front of goal against his former club.

He deflected a the goalkeeper's kick which bounced off the crossbar, and he started to celebrate thinking the ball had crossed the line. It hadn’t, and by the time he realised, Hull's defenders had responded to avert the danger.

The player had his head in his hands after that moment, but he was hugely instrumental from there on out, providing three assists. The opening was for the first goal as his pass teed up Neto to finish from range. Six minutes after the second half began, it was 2-0 as the forward's corner went directly in through the keeper's legs.

Contest Sealed and Attention Shifts

Soon after Neto’s second, the match was put beyond doubt as a dazzling run from the forward teed up Estêvão to tap into an unguarded goal. Neto then finished his treble as the provider again played the crucial ball for the attacker to calmly convert by a helpless Phillips.

At that point, the work Hull had put in in the opening thirty minutes had been forgotten. Their focus must now switch back to securing a promotion to the top division under Sergej Jakirovic, who left out a number of key players with that aim in mind.

"I think we deserved at least one goal but if we perform like this we will be in a strong position in the Championship," the Hull manager commented. "Keep fighting, maybe in the next games this can be a positive example of how we should play."

Hull showed great endeavour to the end, and they nearly claimed a late goal when a substitute struck a the upright in stoppage time. But this was Chelsea’s night, and another encouraging step forward for their new manager at a stadium he is familiar with intimately.

Cup History Are Promising

That resulted in an in the end straightforward night's performance, and the cup competition signs are good from here for Chelsea. They have played Hull on three other times in this competition in the past ten years and on each occasion, they have gone on to reach the final. There is still done in that regard, but this was another significant tick for the Chelsea boss.