Having netted his first treble for the Blues in our 5-2 victory at Wolverhampton Wanderers last season, the 23-year-old made more club history with his effort against the Hatters at Stamford Bridge which secured a visit to Barnsley for the fifth round next month.

Abraham’s hat-trick was Chelsea’s first in the competition since January 2016 when Oscar enjoyed an excellent afternoon at Milton Keynes as we cruised to a 5-1 victory over MK Dons in the fourth round.

The Brazilian scored all of his goals in the opening half, tapping in our first goal after 15 minutes, restoring our lead with a clinical finish just after the half-hour mark and then producing a fine solo strike to kill off the tie just before half-time.

Oscar’s heroics came seven years after a superlative effort by Nicolas Anelka on Valentine’s Day 2009 which kept alive our FA Cup dreams against Watford at Vicarage Road.

The home side had threatened a shock when they took the lead against the run of play but Anelka turned things around in the final 15 minutes, equalising with a smart overhead kick in the 75th minute before nodding in Ashley Cole’s cross two minutes later to give us the lead.

The Frenchman despatched his third in stopping time after he was found on the edge of the box by Salomon Kalou to seal a 3-1 victory as we marched on to lift the cup for the fifth time.

Our previous two FA Cup triumphs also featured hat-tricks in earlier rounds. Frank Lampard notched his first for Chelsea in our 6-1 thumping of Macclesfield at the Bridge in the third round in January 2007 while Gustavo Poyet was on target three times when we beat Hull City by a similar score at Boothferry Park in the third round in 1999/2000.

There was also a hat-trick en route to our first FA Cup triumph in 1970 when Peter Osgood sank Queens Park Rangers in a quarter-final derby. Despite the diabolical muddy conditions at Loftus Road, the King of Stamford Bridge shone in his bright yellow kit as fired us to a 4-2 victory over our west London rivals.

Unlike Anelka, Lampard and Osgood, Kerry Dixon did not enjoy FA Cup final success with the Blues but our third-highest all-time scorer is one of only three Chelsea players who has scored four or more goals in an FA Cup tie. He achieved that with his four-goal haul in our 5-0 victory at Wigan in 1985, emulating Bob Whittingham who had done so over 70 years earlier in a 5-2 victory over Southend United in 1913.

However, George Hilsdon still holds the club’s record for most goals by a player in an FA Cup tie after he netted a ‘double hat-trick’ of six goals in our 9-1 thumping of Worksop in 1908.