Zhang Chenglong of China competing in the horizontal bar during the men's gymnastics team final in the North Greenwich Arena.  The only part of the men's team gymnastics final that fell in line with general expectations Monday was that China would successfully defend its Olympic gold from the Beijing Games.  Everything else turned out to be subject to revision, even after the event was over.  As word spread across London that Britain's much-beloved gymnastics team had managed to win a surprise silver medal, things took a strange turn. Japan, which had finished fourth, decided to appeal a score in the day's final event, in which superstar Kohei Uchimura appeared to fall off the pommel horse.  While officials huddled to review his routine, the crowd at North Greenwich Arena waited. After five minutes, a new score popped up on the stadium display: Japan was awarded an additional 0.7 of a point, bouncing Britain to the bronze and drawing boos from the pro-British crowd.  Britain's bronze-winning gymnast Max Whitlock looks across at Japan's silver-medal-winning gymnasts during the medal ceremony after the men's gymnastics team final on July 30.  Even more distraught were the Ukrainians, who dropped out of the medal standings to fourth. They stood behind the rings apparatus with arms akimbo, staring at the scoreboard that hangs in the arena's center. Ukraine coach Yuliy Kuksenkov said his team deserved a medal, but he was resigned to the result. "I can't change anything," he said. "In our discipline, possibly there is some preferences in judging—possibly."  Fabian Hambüchen competed on the rings in men's artistic gymnastics.  Get the latest Journal coverage of the 2012 Games right here—every story, video, photo or tweet related to the competition and all news off the field.  The first major scoring controversy of the London Games again highlighted the subjective nature of gymnastics, one of the few Olympic sports that rely on judges.  The kerfuffle also overshadowed China's team, which has won every major men's event since 2006, and also the surprising flaws of the Americans, who blundered their way to fifth. It also marred the ascendance of the British gymnasts, who hadn't even qualified for a men's team final since 1924.  But the demotion to bronze didn't disappoint the home-team athletes. "We already exceeded our expectations by qualifying," said British captain Louis Smith, a fan favorite because of his pommel-horse mastery and Mohawk-style coif. "This is a beautiful day for British gymnastics."  The confusion started when Japan's Uchimura climbed onto the pommel horse, considered the sport's hardest event. The very last performer of the day, Uchimura already knew that China had clinched gold and that he would need only a mediocre score to secure silver for his team.  It seemed like a cinch for the reigning three-time world champion, dubbed "Superman" because he never seems to fail.  At the end of his routine, Uchimura awkwardly descended from the horse. The judges decided that he fell.  Japan's team coach immediately objected to the score, saying Uchimura had nailed a difficult dismount. A technical committee then reviewed his dismount 10 times on video before deciding to add the 0.7 point to his total.  "We can say justice has won," said André Gueisbuhler, secretary-general of the International Gymnastics Federation. "I am sure the Ukranians are very sad, and so are the British. But the Japanese have won the medal that they deserved."  Gymnastics scrapped its perfect-10 high score in 2006, replacing it with one that was supposed to remove some human error by instituting one score for the difficulty achieving certain moves, alongside a second, more subjective score for execution.  A judge watches as Kohei Uchimura of Japan comes off the pommel horse during the men's gymnastics team final.  But even the difficulty points have to be assigned by humans. "Everybody is human and everybody can make errors," Gueisbuhler said. "The dismount of Kohei was a very tricky thing to judge. You are talking about angles, and those decisions have to be given in quick time."  Teams can only appeal—or, in the parlance of the sport, "inquire"—the difficulty portion of their own scores. They can't object to the points they get for execution, or to other teams' scores. Gueisbuhler said this was the first time a scoring appeal had affected Olympic-medal results.  Uchimura said he had "regret" about winning silver and felt sorry for the British and Ukrainian teams—to an extent. "It is very strange to say I feel sorry for them," he said. "But this is the scoring system. I shouldn't feel sorry for them."  Uchimura looked unhappy with his own and his team's performance. He said he wasn't tired but made too many adjustments. "I may have been thinking too much about putting on a good performance," he said.  There was little drama for the American team, which came into the arena with the swagger of a medal favorite.  While less celebrated than the dominant U.S. women's team, they had won bronze at last year's world championships and finished first in Saturday's qualifying event. Their two best gymnasts, Danell Leyva of Florida and John Orozco of New York, are medal contenders in Wednesday's individual all-around final.  The Japanese team lodging a complaint with judges about the scoring of that routine.  After starting with a so-so showing on the floor exercise, the U.S. team headed to the pommel horse, which has long challenged Americans teams. Leyva fell off the apparatus. Minutes later, Orozco accidentally sat on it and ending up tallying the day's worst pommel score. The Bronx native then ended U.S. hopes for any medal when he landed on his rear-end during the vault routine. His eyes welled as he pushed himself off the ground. "I feel personally responsible, because I did five events and I botched on two of them," he said. "It hurts."  The Chinese, on the other hand, said they won because they were flawless. On routine after routine, the team, egged on by Chinese fans waving flags, performed the final's most difficult moves without stumbling. "That is our secret to beat the Japanese—and beat everyone," said Feng Zhe, who had the top parallel-bar score of all gymnasts in the team final.  The Japanese gymnasts posing with their bronze medals.  Perfection hadn't been a sure thing for the Chinese team after the preliminaries, where the team had numerous errors and placed sixth. In a news conference, Feng denied that the team was trying to trick the competition. "A betting company didn't sponsor us, so we don't need to send a smoke screen," he said. Asked in a news conference what they thought about Britain's medal, all of the members of the Chinese team applauded. Said team member Chen Yibing in English: "Very good."  Write to Geoffrey A. Fowler at geoffrey.fowler@wsj.com and Stu Woo at Stu.Woo@wsj.com  A version of this article appeared July 31, 2012, on page D7 in the U.S. edition of The Wall Street Journal, with the headline: Upon Further Review—Japan Medals, Britain Settles and China Dominates.
Chinese men won their second straight Olympic title Monday, while a late judge's ruling knocked host Great Britain, which thought it had a surprise silver, down to bronze. Japan took the silver.