Led by Olympic and five-times world champion Kohei Uchimura, the Japanese side, which also includes Ryohei Kato, Kazuma Kaya, Kenzo Shirai, Yusuke Tanaka and Naoto Hayasaka, posted a combined score of 358.884.

The 26-year-old impressed in the vault discipline, recording a score of 15.633 and looked composed on the tricky parallel bars, though he was visibly frustrated when he fell during his floor routine, which he blamed on being made to wait before he could perform due to the judges deliberating on one of his teammate's marks.

"I waited a long time and my body cooled down," he said.

"So I couldn't move as I wanted to.

"At the beginning of the exercise it was fine, but at the end, I couldn't perform as I had wished."

Despite that mishap, which was greeted with gasps from the crowd inside the venue, he looks likely to be the top all-around men’s qualifier thanks to a total of 90.564, giving him good preparation for Friday’s (October 30) final where he will bid for an historic sixth straight title.

China, gold medallists at the 2014 World Championships on home soil in Nanning as well as at London 2012, mirrored the performance of their women the previous day, quietly going about their business on the way to a total of 357.027.

Their squad, comprised of Deng Shudi, Lin Chaopan, the 2013 parallel bars champion, Liu Yang, Xiao Ruoteng, You Hao and Zhang Chenglong, were perhaps leaving enough in the tank in order to give them the best possible chance of retaining their crown.

The Chinese sextet found particular joy on the parallel bars, so often the cause of falls and stumbles, scoring a commanding 62.099.

The first day of men’s qualification at the event in Glasgow had begun with the eagerly-anticipated entrance of the British team, who narrowly missed out on a podium finish in Nanning last year, though they made a shaky start as World Championships debutant Brinn Bevan and Max Whitlock both fell from the high bar.

Britain’s nervous beginning was in stark contrast to the rest of their serene display, with Daniel Purvis taking the early individual all-around lead with a score of 88.956 before he was eventually usurped by the formidable Uchimura in the afternoon session.

The hosts, whose team also featured Louis Smith, who became the first British gymnast to earn an Olympic medal since 1928 with silver at Beijing 2008, Kristian Thomas and Nile Wilson, finished the day in third place with a total of 354.417.

There was early drama among the British contingent as Whitlock squeezed through as Britain’s second individual representative in the all-around final, an event which he claimed silver in at the 2014 World Championships, ahead of Nile Wilson.

The pair were deadlocked with totals of 88.365 but Whitlock progressed by a mere 0.133 thanks to the tie-break rule which sees the lowest of the six scores dropped from the overall mark.

All three nations look well-placed to earn an all-important berth at next year’s Olympic Games, with the top eight teams all securing a Rio 2016 spot.

2014 World Championships bronze medallists the United States headline tomorrow’s action, which will bring the qualification phase of the event to a close.

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