Pedro Neto Fires Treble as Chelsea Deliver Manager Rosenior with Joyous Homecoming to Hull City

Amid freezing rain, snow, and a biting wind off the waters of the Humber Estuary, alongside a determined Hull City side pushing hard for a top-flight place, this had all the makings of a challenging night's task for Chelsea.

"We could have scored more but Hull are a good team and it was a difficult fixture; I am very pleased with the performance," the manager stated. "Hull City means a lot to me so it was nice to get a good welcome from both sets of supporters. The application of the players was excellent."

Liam Rosenior holds this place close to his heart, given some of his family are from Hull and his successful period in management of the Championship club. This positive connection was extended with a magnificent performance from his squad, who ultimately sauntered into the fifth round of the famous old competition.

Clinical Edge Secures Comprehensive Win

Three days removed from surrendering a two-goal advantage in the Premier League, there was a hint of vulnerability about them going into this potentially tricky tie. The capacity Hull crowd clearly felt it too, but Rosenior's men navigated the challenge with ease.

Rosenior rang the changes, enacting multiple of them to his XI. The tie could and perhaps should have been settled earlier than it eventually was, with both the Brazilian winger and Liam Delap at fault for spurning glorious chances to put Chelsea in front in the first half.

But, fortunately for the away team, their Portuguese attacker was in a much more clinical mood. He opened the scoring with a marvellous distance strike, which proved to be the spark for his team to assume command of proceedings. By full time, they had 4 goals, with Neto netting a trio of them for a brilliant hat-trick.

Delap's Response and Impact

The home side showed plenty of fight all game, but the better chances always came to the visitors. Estêvão should have broken the deadlock when he went past keeper the Hull stopper before unbelievably firing over. The striker then had a similar nightmare moment in front of goal against his former club.

He deflected a the goalkeeper's clearance which came off the bar, and he began to run away thinking the ball had gone over the line. It hadn’t, and by the time he understood, Hull's defenders had responded to avert the threat.

Delap had his head in his hands after that miss, but he was hugely influential from there on out, providing three key passes. The opening was for the opening goal as his through ball set up his teammate to finish from range. Shortly after the second half began, it was 2-0 as Neto's set-piece went straight in under the keeper's legs.

Contest Sealed and Attention Turns

Seven minutes after Neto’s second, the match was effectively ended as a dazzling run from Delap laid on Estêvão to tap into an unguarded goal. The hat-trick hero then finished his treble as the provider again delivered the crucial ball for the attacker to coolly convert past a stranded Phillips.

At that point, the effort Hull had done in the first thirty minutes had been forgotten. Their priority must now switch back to achieving a return to the Premier League under their manager, who rested a number of first-choice individuals with that goal in mind.

"In my opinion we deserved at least one goal but if we perform like this we will be in a strong situation in the league," the Hull manager commented. "Keep fighting, maybe in the next matches this can be a good lesson of how we should play."

There was great effort to the final whistle, and they nearly got a late goal when a substitute hit a the upright in injury time. But this was Chelsea’s night, and another encouraging stride for their new head coach at a place he knows very well.

Cup History Are Promising

The result resulted in an in the end routine evening’s work, and the FA Cup-shaped signs are good from here for the winners. They have faced Hull on three other times in this competition in the past ten years and every single time, they have progressed to make the showpiece. There is still done in that regard, but this was another huge tick for the Chelsea boss.