The Big Story: Japan, South Korea take on illustrious rivals for shot at World Cup quarter-finals

Catch the latest news reports on The Big Story, The Straits Times’ weekday online news programme. 

For the first time, Asia could have two teams in the quarter-finals of a World Cup. On Monday,

Japan take on Croatia,

beaten finalists in 2018, before

South Korea attempt to tame record five-time champions Brazil,

in back-to-back round-of-16 ties.

Sports correspondent Sazali Abdul Aziz joins the show from Qatar to give his take on the matches.

In other stories,

The Land Transport Authority has awarded a $758 million contract

to design and build a 5km tunnel for the second phase of the Cross Island MRT Line (CRL), 2km of which will pass beneath the Central Catchment Nature Reserve.

A joint venture between Obayashi Corp and Shanghai Tunnel Engineering Co (Singapore) will construct the 5km tunnel between Fairways Drive and Sin Ming Walk.

It also gave out a separate $496 million contract for Punggol interchange station under the CRL Punggol extension. Construction firm Woh Hup will build the CRL Punggol Interchange station, which is located in Punggol Central.