China's gymnastics gold-medal blitz

China's gold-medal blitz at the world gymnastics championships continued on Sunday as Deng Linlin, Wang Guanyin and Zou Kai won individual titles at the O2 Arena.

On a day hosts Great Britain were able to celebrate a gold thanks to Beth Tweddle in the women's floor exercise, China again showed why they are the dominant force in international gymnastics at present.

Deng, 17, produced an excellent routine packed with difficulty to see off Australian Lauren Mitchell to the women's beam title before Wang edged compatriot Feng Zhe to gold on the parallel bars.

In the last final of the championships, Olympic champion Zou was the winner of a high-quality field in the men's high bar.

It took China's final gold-medal tally at the championships to six - He Kexin, Zhang Hongtao and Yan Mingyong won titles on Saturday. The nation picked up seven individual golds in last year's Olympic Games in Beijing.

Romania's Marian Dragulescu, in the men's vault, was the other gold medallist on the tournament's fourth and final day.

Deng, who won team gold with the Chinese at the Beijing Games, picked up her first major individual title with a fantastic score of 15.000 points.

She was run close by Mitchell, who grabbed silver with 14.875 points, and Ivana Hong of the United States was third.

Deng, a specialist on the beam, threw in a mix of gymnastic and acrobatic elements to her routine, with one move - a double back-flip and high straight back-somersault - midway through particularly impressing the crowd.

She also nailed the landing to her finishing move, which consisted of two back-flips and a double-pike dismount.

Zou followed up his gold-medal display in Beijing with another thrilling exhibition here.

Performing the most difficult routine of all the eight qualifiers, he was a class above and the only competitor to go above 16.000 points - he scored 16.150.

Epke Zonderland, of the Netherlands, was a surprise silver medallist and Italy's Igor Cassina, the 2004 Olympic champion, took bronze.

Wang and Zeng stole the show in the parallel bars, the former beating his team-mate by just 0.200. Japan's Kazuhito Tanaka took the bronze.

Tweddle, the 2006 world champion on the uneven bars, thrilled the home crowd with a routine of excellent tumbling combinations to open the event.

Her score of 14.650 held out despite the best efforts of Mitchell, who finished just 0.100 behind to claim her second silver of the day. China's Sui Lu took bronze.

An injury to Colombia's Jessica Gil Ortiz, who was second up on the floor, threatened to overshadow Tweddle's achievements.

Gil Ortiz landed on her head as she finished off a tumbling exercise a third of the way through her routine. She was treated by seven medics as action was held up for more than five minutes, and she was carried out of the auditorium on a stretcher with her neck in a brace.

It was later announced she was taken to hospital as a precaution, that she was conscious and that her injury was not serious.

Earlier, Dragulescu claimed his second gold medal at this year's championships by winning the men's individual vault title.

The 28-year-old added to the floor gold he picked up on Saturday by nailing two difficult attempts on the vault in sublime style.

Dragulescu has now won four world vault titles in his career, and eight world golds overall - the other four coming on the floor.

Flavius Koczi grabbed silver to make it a Romanian 1-2 while Anton Golotsutskov got the bronze, the same medal the Russian claimed at the Olympics last year.

Dragulescu, who only recently came out of retirement which had been brought on by neck and back problems, admitted the pressure was off him after his floor gold.

"It means a lot to me," he said. "Since 2006 I haven't had a chance to win a world medal. And it's been so difficult because the level of gymnastics is very high now.

"It's a bigger challenge for me, so I'm very happy."

North Korea's Ri Se Gwang was tipped to challenge for the medals but he fell onto his face on landing on his first vault, forcing him out of contention.