Manly's Stewart brothers have come a long way since forging their early reputations in the steel city, writes Will Swanton.

Memory lane is Figtree Oval: burning sun, kookaburra sitting on the black dot, long grass, weeds, litter, graffiti across the concrete toilet block - the place where the Stewart brothers ran amok for a decade.

A sign bars dogs and horses from the fields, there's holes in the wire fences and the constant roar of traffic from the adjoining Princes Highway. There's no Stewart Brothers Grandstand because there's no grandstand.

"They started playing in the under-sixes over there. They played on those two fields when they got a bit bigger. They played grade over here when they were teenagers," the Stewart brothers' father, Barry, says as he walks across the Western Suburbs Red Devils' home ground in Wollongong.

It's from this run-down joint that Manly plucked the Stewarts and sent them striding on their way to the vertigo-inducing heights of an NRL grand final at ANZ Stadium. They had some adjusting to do when they moved to the big smoke. So did their father. Barry felt lost. Two of his finest mates were gone. No more cricket in their dead-end street, for starters.

He laughs and says he was like the father in those TV ads who steams in to bowl at his young son, gets him out, screams with antagonistic delight and points the way back to the imaginary pavilion.

"I didn't know what to do when they left," he says.

" I got a bit depressed."

He keeps looking around the empty fields.

"I've got a few memories, yeah," he says. "There was an under-18s country game at Corrimal. Glenn sort of busted about five blokes. He got the ball on the 20-metre line, ran up, busted through these five blokes, got to the other 20. He was just hanging there, their last bloke was on him, and Brett came running through.

"Glenn set him up to score. That was a pretty good try, a good try by them together. Glenn was always pretty tough and physical. Brett scored some great tries on this ground."

Memory lane: Brett being diagnosed with diabetes. Aged 12, Brett broke down in tears during an English class, stood up and felt faint without knowing the reason for any of it. His parents were called.

They took him to hospital. Brett now gives himself four injections a day. Barry sat him down and told him the seriousness of the condition and how they would all help him through it. Barry and his wife Narelle gave themselves injections so they knew how it felt. Aged 17, with his condition still not under control, Brett moved to Manly with his 18-year-old brother.

"It makes me wonder," Barry says. "I think about him being a diabetic and how much energy he would have if he wasn't a diabetic. When he did get that diabetes, he didn't play for a year. He was lethargic all the time, even though he was fit.

"When he first went to Manly he was the same. We knew five minutes into a game how he was feeling. He wasn't unfit, it was just his sugar levels. Manly helped sort him out. They've been a terrific club for both our boys. Glenn has been a life-saver for Brett, to be honest. Glenn looks out for him all the time.

"He knows Brett's symptoms and knows when he's run down. That was the relief for both us when they both went to Manly. That was a worry for us back then, wasn't it?"

Narelle nods.

"It was an experimental treatment the specialist put Brett on," she says.

"He was lucky enough to be one of the people who trialled it. I think he was one of only about 10.

"There weren't many of them. It worked for him and that was a relief for us all. We thought he'd be home for a few more years. But then Glenn kept an eye on him.

"It put our minds at ease, having them move away together."

Brett and Glenn, 23 and 24, are crucial links in the Manly chain, World Cup aspirants, flatmates. Brett has been an NRL megastar for a few years. Glenn has only just started to enter the same stratosphere.

"Glenn has always been tough," Barry says. "In his first year in first grade he ended up getting the forward of the year.

"Forwards, it always takes them longer. It was no secret to anyone down here how good he was.

"He just had to bide his time. Manly have had Ben Kennedy and Steve Menzies in that position.

"He just had to wait his turn. He's taken the chance with both hands, no doubt about that. The old president down here at Wests, I was talking to him on the phone the other week. He said, 'Glenn is just playing like he did at Wests.' People think he's become a new player. He hasn't.

"This is how he's always played. The only change is probably that he's gotten more confident. Brett puts it in a nutshell. Glenn has got his own position now, all he has to do is go out and play like he's always done."

They're from Dragons-Steelers territory, the Sharks and Roosters showed interest, but Manly got their men because they wanted them both.

The Stewart brothers are now regarded as two of the better blokes in rugby league. Here's why. Their father is a friendly man with a big laugh and a firm handshake. Their mother is a lovely woman who gives you a peck on the cheek when she says goodbye. They walk slowly back across memory lane. The only time Barry's face drops is when he thinks about the day they went away. And the possibility of them ever coming back. "I don't think they will," Barry says. "No, no, no. I don't think they'll ever be back."