Gregory Rusedski was born on the 6th of September 1973 in Montreal, Quebec, Canada.
His mother, Helen was an Englishwoman who left her native town of Dewsbury, Yorkshire with her parents at the age of four to go and live in Canada.
His father, Tom, a railway worker, was originally German, with Polish-Ukranian parents, hence the Polish surname of Rusedski.
Greg grew up in Montreal, with his brother Bill who was three year older, and from the early age of seven showed to have enormous liking and aptitude for the game of tennis.
As he later admitted, the player, John McEnroe had been very influential on him as a child, and inspired him to play.
"McEnroe was such a character, so gifted, with an incredible fighting spirit. That's what brought me into tennis."
Greg started competing in Canadian juniors tournaments, winning six national titles between 1985 and 1990. He was the Under 14 and later Under 18 Canadian Champion. He even began playing satellite
tournaments at the age of 15.
Greg met his present girlfriend, Lucy Connor, in 1991, when, aged 17, he played a junior tennis tournament at Thames Ditton. Lucy was the ball-girl for his match. They met again afterwards, recognising each other from before, and started going out.
In that same year, the year in which he later turned professional, he won the Wimbledon Junior Doubles title with Morrocan Karim Alami, and reached the junior singles semi-finals of both Wimbledon and the US Open.
After Wimbledon, Greg invited Lucy to the Champions' Dinner, to which only trophy winners and their guests were invited.
They saw each other frequently over the next four years, with Greg making regular trips from Canada, to Lucy's then home in Purley, Surrey. In fact, had it not been for those frequent trips, Greg might not have been able to switch to playing for Britain, as by LTA rules, you have to spend a certain number of weeks living in the country in order to qualify.
The first Challenger title Greg won was in Newcastle, England in 1992.
In 1993, Greg qualified for Wimbledon, his first ever Grand Slam. Soon after, he won his first ever ATP Tour title in Newport, USA. That year he was also nominated for the ATP newcomer of the year award.
In 1995 Greg won another ATP Tour title in Seoul and was a finalist at an ATP Tour event in Coral Springs. He also applied to change the country he played for to Britain. Greg's cahange from a Canadian to British player was well documented in the press. On the 22nd of May 1995 he officially qualified to play for Great Britain. His first match as a British player, which he also lost, was against Mark Petchey, another British player at Queen's Club in London.
Two weeks later he went on to play at Wimbledon, where he reached fourth round. There he received alot of Press attention. He even agreed to sport a Union Jack bandana, which The Sun Newspaper sent him.
Greg's change from a Canadian to a British player brought with it alot of detractors. Firstly there were people in Canada who disowned him as a player, due to a misguided feeling that he was somehow 'disloyal'. Then there were some sceptics in Britain who did not want to accept him as a British player and continued to label him as 'Canadian'.
That year Greg continued his success, reaching the semi-finals of a Tour event in Basle, and made his Davis Cup debut for Britain against Monaco. He also served 685 aces thet year, finishing 5th on the Tour aces count.
