Pole raised German article and fought (7)
I believe the answer is:
sparred
'fought' is the definition.
(sparring is a kind of fighting)
'pole raised german article' is the wordplay.
'pole' becomes 'spar' (spar is a kind of pole).
'raised' is a reversal indicator (going up in a down clue).
'german article' becomes 'der' (definite article in German).
'der' reversed gives 'red'.
'spar'+'red'='SPARRED'
'and' acts as a link.
(Other definitions for sparred that I've seen before include "Did train at boxing" , "Boxed; argued" , "Fought" .)