The initial two days of the three-day competition has witnessed the world's top taekwondo teams compete to claim the world title through a round-robin preliminary stage followed by single-elimination based quarter finals.

Competing in the men's division are hosts Aruba, Iran, South Korea, Spain, Russia, Egypt, Venezuela, Chinese Taipei, Dominican Republic, the United States, Brazil, Uzbekistan and China.

Meanwhile, in the women's division, South Korea, China, France, Venezuela, Brazil, Croatia, Russia, Colombia, Chinese Taipei and the US sparred for the top honours.

Spain's men team won their game against Chinese Taipei 17-11, while the Chinese beat Brazil by 24-13 and South Korea - one of the competition's seeded teams - defeated the Dominican Republic 23-14.

The men's US team pulled out of their quarter-final match against Iran, meaning the Iranians were automatically granted entry into the semi-finals.

But it was a disappointing competition for Uzbekistan who fought hard to battle through to the quarter-finals but could not overcome their ten point deduction hit for failing to meet the obligatory minimum number of five athletes with an additional one substitute.

The Aruban male team, although receiving an enormous support from home fans, failed to win any of their matches.

Meanwhile, in the women's division, a close bout between Croatia and favourite's South Korea ended in a 13-12 victory for the Croatians and an impressive performance from France saw them through to the semi-finals after beating Columbia with a 24-15 stretch.

The competition featured two rounds of five minutes - a style adopted by WTF to enhance spectators entertainment - along with a second round tag match format.

The finals are due to take place tomorrow.

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