Struggle with awful sleet on river (7)
I believe the answer is:
wrestle
'struggle' is the definition.
(wrestling is a kind of struggling)
'with awful sleet on river' is the wordplay.
'with' becomes 'w' (abbreviation).
'awful' indicates anagramming the letters.
'on' indicates putting letters inside (as in clothing 'on' a person).
'river' becomes 'r' (abbreviation for river).
'sleet' anagrammed gives 'estle'.
'estle' placed around 'r' is 'restle'.
'w'+'restle'='WRESTLE'
(Other definitions for wrestle that I've seen before include "Fight in the ring" , "Grapple on canvas" , "Struggle, grapple" , "Fight; struggle" , "Struggle (with a difficult problem)" .)