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Against a backdrop of sleet, snow, and a swirling wind off the waters of the Humber, alongside a determined Hull City side pushing hard for a top-flight place, this presented all the ingredients of a challenging evening’s work for the visitors.

"We might have scored more but the opposition are a strong team and it was a tough fixture; I am delighted with the display," the manager stated. "Hull City is very special to me so it was nice to get a good welcome from both sets of supporters. The attitude of the players was excellent."

Liam Chelsea manager has this place close to his heart, considering some of his family hail from Hull and his enjoyable spell in charge of the Tigers. This positive connection continued with a magnificent performance from his team, who ultimately sauntered into the next round of the FA Cup.

Deadly Edge Secures Comfortable Victory

Three days removed from letting slip a two-goal lead in the league, there was a hint of vulnerability about them going into this potentially tricky cup clash. The packed home support evidently sensed it too, but the London side handled the challenge perfectly.

The manager made alterations, making multiple of them to his starting lineup. The match might and maybe should have been settled earlier than it actually was, with two Estêvão Willian and Liam Delap at fault for spurning excellent chances to put Chelsea ahead in the opening period.

However, fortunately for the visitors, their Portuguese attacker was in a much more clinical frame of mind. He opened the scoring with a spectacular distance strike, which proved to be the spark for Chelsea to assume command of the match. By the final whistle, they had four, with the forward netting three of them for a superb hat-trick.

Delap's Redemption and Impact

Hull showed great fight throughout, but the clearer opportunities always came to the visitors. Estêvão should have broken the deadlock when he rounded goalkeeper the Hull stopper before unbelievably firing over. The striker then had a similar horror moment in front of goal against his former club.

He blocked a Phillips's kick which bounced back from the crossbar, and he 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 clear the threat.

Delap had his head in his hands after that miss, but he was hugely influential from there on out, registering three assists. The first was for the first goal as his pass set up his teammate to score from outside the box. Six minutes after the restart, it was two as Neto's corner went straight in under the keeper's legs.

Tie Sealed and Attention Turns

Seven minutes after the second, the match was put beyond doubt as a magnificent run from the forward laid on Estêvão to tap into an empty net. Neto then completed his hat-trick as the provider once again played the decisive ball for the striker to calmly slot by a helpless Phillips.

At that point, the effort Hull had done in the first thirty minutes had long since erased. Their priority must now switch back to securing a promotion to the Premier League under their manager, who rested several first-choice players with that goal in mind.

"I think we earned at least one goal but if we perform like this we will be in a very good situation in the Championship," he said. "Keep fighting, maybe in the next games this can be a good lesson of how we must play."

There was great endeavour to the end, and they almost claimed a consolation when a substitute struck a post in stoppage time. But this was Chelsea’s night, and another encouraging step forward for their recently-appointed head coach at a place he knows very well.

FA Cup History Look Promising

That made for an in the end straightforward evening’s work, and the cup competition signs are good from here for Chelsea. They have faced Hull on three previous occasions in this competition in the last decade and every single time, they have gone on to make the showpiece. There is still done in that respect, but this was another significant positive for the Chelsea boss.