Identical twins Dina and Arina Averina have dominated the sport and were widely expected to battle for gold, but the ROC pair were surprisingly beaten to the title by Israel's Linoy Ashram.

She ended on a score of 107.800 and became the first non-Russian gymnast to win gold since Ukraine's Ekaterina Serebrianskaya did so at Atlanta 1996.

Dina Averina had to settle for silver on 107.650 and Alina Harnasko of Belarus bagged bronze on 102.700, meaning Arina missed out on the medals in fourth.

The ROC criticised the judging and called the result an "injustice", and saw several enquiries into the scoring rejected on the night.

A main source of contention is that Ashram dropped the ribbon during her final routine, although she did score the highest marks with the other three apparatus.

ROC President Stanislav Pozdnyakov told Russian state news agency TASS that FIG had missed a deadline after their appeal had been submitted.

"Unfortunately, they missed the deadline, which we indicated in the letter, they are working on our appeal with a delay," he said.

Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said the judges had committed "forgery in front of the whole world.”

"Those who started the Russophobic war against the sport could not allow this victory," she said, according to The Times of Israel.

Ashram said that the judging was "very good" and that she did not have a problem with it.

But the ROC said Dina Averina should be champion and added: "She lost the Olympics to a rival who made a gross error.

"Before the final decision, the judges counted the points for an exponentially long time. 

"More precisely, they calculated.

"We are sensitive to injustice." 

The ROC also missed out on the group all-around title, for the first time since Atlanta 1996, as Bulgaria took gold.