Roger Federer has quite inexplicably continued to dominate tennis over the past year, despite being 36 years of age.

Despite being written off due to his advancing years, the Swiss has won three of the last five grand slams, making it to a record 20 in total.

Federer dropped only two sets in the entirety of the Australian Open last month, both of which came in the final against Marin Cilic, which shows that even at his age he is still a supreme talent.

Alongside Rafael Nadal, they have rolled back the years to overtake Novak Djokovic and Andy Murray, even though the latter two have suffered fairly serious injuries.

Nadal won the French and US Opens last year, but could only reach the quarter-finals in Melbourne before retiring hurt against Cilic.

Federer could be on hand to take advantage of the Spaniard's latest setback at the ATP Rotterdam tournament, for which he accepted a wildcard entry.

If he reaches the semi-finals of the event, he will reclaim the world number one spot, becoming the oldest player to do so in the history of tennis.

The Swiss will surpass Andre Agassi's current record of 33 years and 13 days quite comfortably, being over three years his senior, making yet another piece of history in the game.

And things have just become a little easier for him to achieve that feat.

That is because Stan Wawrinka, his fellow compatriot, has crashed out of the tournament at the round of 32 stage, losing to world number 259 Tallon Griekspoor.

Even though Wawrinka is recovering from a knee injury it was still an almighty shock for him to bow out at the first hurdle.

As a result, there is not a single player left in Rotterdam that has ever beaten Federer in their career.

It looks almost certain, therefore, that tennis' most successful ever player will be back on top of the world, assuming he isn't the victim of a shattering shock like Wawrinka.

Federer is always very professional and will prepare accordingly, but to have a statistic like that in your favour when on the verge of history can only be a good thing.

He gets his tournament underway against Ruben Bemelmans of Belgium later tonight, as he begins his march towards the number one spot once again.