US basketball star forward Josh Childress decided to stay one more year at Olympiakos.

The former Atlanta Hawks star answered “yes” to Olympiakos’s question as to whether he would honour his contract that ends in June 2010 and stay in Piraeus.

Although Childress also had some offers from the NBA, most notably the Cleveland Cavaliers, he decided to spend another season in Greece where he is set to receive $5 million, a figure that no NBA team was prepared to offer him.

Reports suggest that his performances with Olympiakos last season did little to raise his profile across the Atlantic.

“I’ve got some unfinished business in Greece,” said Childress last week.

Meanwhile, Greece suffered a setback meaning that the men’s national basketball team is set to be severely weakened for the European Championship of this September in Poland.

Dimitris Diamantidis, Panayiotis Vassilopoulos, Costas Tsartsaris and Theo Papaloukas will miss the Eurobasket due to injuries.

The Greek captain will not participate in the 2009 championship on September 7-20, citing an injury to his ankle and years of tiredness.

“This has been one of the most difficult decisions of my life. Much as I want it, I will not be able to help the national team this year,” said Papaloukas in a statement at his own website.

“Unfortunately, my attempt to play in the last game of the league’s final series for Olympiakos with the injury that I had has aggravated my condition and my ankle is yet to recover 100 percent. “Besides there is the accumulated tiredness of many years as since 2000 I was always present at the national team call-ups after ending my arduous season with my clubs.

After all I am 32 years old and I must view things in their right dimension,” stated Papaloukas.

National coach Jonas Kazlauskas is about to name his full squad for the first stage of preparation ahead of the Eurobasket in the next few days.