Scouts from the Wearside club were known to have attended the First Division game between Wimbledon and Stockport at the weekend.
The main target was believed to have been David Connolly, who would have caught the Black Cats spies' eye with his 12th goal of the season, but Stockport's Shefki Kuqi was also a possible target.
The former Blackburn target is desperate to leave Edgeley Park and he would be a lot easier to land for Sunderland as his £1 million price tag is a lot less than Connolly's, which is likely to be around the £2.5 million mark.
Reid has told fans that he is continuing his efforts to bring in new players.
He said: "I can assure fans supporters that I'm trying to bring in quality players - some of them get publicised and some of them don't because I prefer not to talk about transfer business until it is completed.
"One player we've been looking at has been highly publicised in recent weeks, but there are others that haven't."
The player that has been brought to attention and the one Reid is referring to is Paris Saint Germain's Nicolas Anelka, who is being strongly linked with a loan move away from the Parc des Princes. It remains to be seen whether PSG will allow him to leave and whether the former Arsenal man wants top return to England.
Meanwhile, Reid has admitted that the club will consider entering the Intertoto Cup next season.
"We haven't entered the Intertoto in the past because I thought that over the last couple of seasons it was important for us to concentrate purely on establishing ourselves as a solid Premiership club.
"I didn't want to risk entering the competition and find us going into a new Premiership season struggling with potential injuries and suspensions.
"It's not the best to qualify for Europe one season and find yourselves at the bottom of the Premiership the next because you haven't got the squad strength in depth.
"That's the only reason we haven't entered in the past, but I think we'll have a different perspective on the situation now if it comes up again."
"To be honest last season I was a little disappointed that we didn't finish higher than seventh.
"But now I feel that we are an established club with an improving and stronger squad and if the Intertoto was to come up again it's something we would have to look at."
Elsewhere, Huddersfield Town have been linked with a move for Sunderland's John Oster, who was on loan at First Division Barnsley.
