SUNDERLAND manager Peter Reid, set to add to this summer's £7.1m transfer outlay, has been strongly linked with two French strikers - and another Argentinian whizz-kid.

The Wearside boss, who is in Brittany with his first-team squad preparing for tomorrow night's opening pre-season friendly against Calais Racing Club - French Cup finalists two season ago - is believed to have arranged for 22-year-old former youth international Cedric Mouret, freed by Marseilles, to have a trial at the club's Whitburn training ground this week.

Reid, who has had meetings with his Continental scouts during his week-long stay at his training base in Le Touquet, has also been linked with Nicolas Bonnal, released by Monaco's new coach, French legend Didier Deschamps.

But Reid could return to Argentina for the exciting winger Maximiliano Rodriguez, who starred in the FIFA World Youth Cup winning team.

Rodriguez, 20, played in the victorious Argentina side alongside Sunderland's Julio Arca and Nicolas Medina and has been impressed with his team-mates' enthusiasm about playing in England.

Rodriguez scored four goals, including one in the final, as he figured in all seven of Argentina's World Youth Cup games.

He is so highly thought of that his club, Newell's Old Boys, are believed to have slapped a £7m price-tag on a player who scored five goals in 18 league games last season.

Reid, who has spent his money so far on Medina and French striker Lilian Laslandes, still has funds in his transfer war-chest and he is desperate to sign an effective right winger who will fill the void left by former fans' favourite Nicky Summerbee.

Meanwhile Reid, who has been impressed with the form in training of Laslandes, is to set up a new partnership between the former French international and his England front man, Kevin Phillips in the Stade Julien Denis.

But he will use most of his 21-man squad, including youngsters Ben Clark, Kevin Kyle, Thomas Butler, George McCartney and Simon Ramsden.