Tank Lanning, reporting in from beneath a table in the beer tent at last year?s George Sevens, was one of a number of South Africans to watch in bemusement as hordes of his countrymen cheered on the All Black side, and jeer their own national team. It?s a hangover from South Africa?s darker days, of course, when New Zealand was backed by way of protest, but you?d have thought that that sentiment would long since have been buried, and that Madiba?s number six jersey would have set the country on the path to a wall of united support.

Instead, New Zealand teams arrive here ? and in Cape Town in particular ? assured of a certain level of support, and while there?s a corresponding irony in the number of New Zealand residents who now turn up to rugby games in Springbok jerseys, it?s still sad to hear All Blacks talk of the delight with which they line up Newlands Tests, knowing they?ll have healthy support in the stands.

But while that?s made for fierce divisions in the stands at Newlands, there are individual players who?ve always won universal acclaim when they?ve taken to the field, and none more so than Tana Umaga, the dreadlocked midfielder who rivals Brian O?Driscoll as the finest centre of the last decade. Appropriate, then, that Umaga rolls into Cape Town this week, the newest and biggest attraction to what?s rapidly becoming one of the hottest tickets on the international rugby calendar: the Castle Cape Town Tens.

A year ago, Bob Skinstad and Ron Rutland, under the direction of Robbie Fleck, pulled off a weekend of carnival rugby that defied even their heady pre-event aspirations: breathtaking running rugby under brilliant blue skies and the backdrop of Table Mountain, all played out to the visual poetry of All Black prop Kees Meeuws finishing 200 Castles in three days, made for a tournament that raced across the game?s international grapevines in the weeks afterwards.

A year later, and the international feedback has translated into a second instalment of the tournament that has Green Point buzzing with anticipation. Umaga leads a stellar collective that includes a past king of the international midfield in Tim Horan, fellow Wallabies Jeremy Paul and Pat Howard, England?s Leon Lloyd, British and Irish Lion Eric Miller, New Zealand-born Italy international Matt Phillips, and Zak Feaunati, the Samoan who played Jonah Lomu in ?Invictus?, as well as Skinstad (now working as a traffic reporter for KFM and Highveld Stereo), Fleck, and the combined weight of John Allen?s Springbok Legends.

But that?s only part of the attraction this weekend: eight international sides have entered from across the planet, including a particularly motley bunch from Hong Kong, and most of them will participate in the beer league, where the rugby might not be quite as polished as in the premier competition, but certainly no less furious. An array of local sides, including the Hollywood Boks, a side of players who starred in ?Invictus? (led by Ryan Scott, who played Brendan Venter in the movie), complete a cosmopolitan field that?s primed to light up Hamilton?s rugby club for the second running of the Tens.

And unsurprisingly, the Tens won?t just be about the rugby: at no small expense (Fleckie?s paid for them personally to fly out from England), top British band The Lightyears headline the Castle marquee for a second year, Afrikaans rapper Carl Jorgens is scheduled to make an appearance, and model Kirsti Lyall follows in Tracy McGregor?s footsteps from a year ago, leading the Castle Cape Town Tens dancers through three days of cheerful rugby mayhem.

It?s the chance to see players like Umaga and Horan that really puts this shine on this year?s tournament, along with the inaugural rugby event at the Cape Town Stadium, with Horan?s International team taking on the Springbok Legends in a warm-up for the Stormers-Boland match that?s already a 40 000 seat sell-out; tickets for the Tens are still available, though, so if you haven?t got your hands on them yet, scream down to Computicket, get to Hamiltons this weekend, and scream cheerfully for Tana Umaga. This time, even Tank Lanning won?t complain.

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