By Jason Kim: World Boxing Council heavyweight champion Vitali Klitschko has been reportedly struggling in his training camp for tonight’s bout against Chris Arreola. According to rumors, Klitschko, 38, has been having major problems with sparring partner Lionel Butler (32-15-1, 25 KO’s), who has been pounding the older Klitschko brother in sparring sessions.

In addition to that, there is talk that Klitschko’s previously injured knee isn’t 100% for tonight’s fight. Now there’s no shame in Klitschko having problems with the 42-year-old Butler, if this is true, because Butler has a lot of power and is able to get low to the ground when sparring with Vitali, but it’s not a good sign going into the fight with Arreola that Vitali is having some issues.

It could be just a match-up thing for Vitali, because Butler is a lot shorter than Vitali at 5’11” compared to the 6’7″ Vitali, and Butler likes to get low and work the body on the inside. However, supposedly is having problems dealing with Butler’s body attacks. What this means for a bout against Arreola in unclear. Arreola is tall at 6’4″, not much of a body puncher and likes to fight at medium distance.

But if Arreola is wise enough to get close and go after Klitschko’s body like Butler, it may pay off dividends for Arreola. He could perhaps trouble Vitali in this manner. But it’s going to take a consistent effort on Arreola’s part to make that happen. Klitschko is an older fighter and not used to be hit to the body. Arreola is going to have to work on Klitschko for a number of rounds to get him to tire out and possibly drop.

As for Klitschko’s knee, this could cause him to have problems getting leverage on his punches because he won’t be able to bend his knee if it’s causing him problems. We might see Vitali fighting more in a straight stand up fashion than he normally does with little or no bending of his knees. Arreola can take advantage of this by aiming for Klitschko’s head or body, both of them will be there for Arreola to hit if Klitschko is unable to get low because of an ailing knee.

Arreola can also create problems for Klitschko if he elects to bob and weave and make Klitschko miss with his punches the same way he did against Chris Byrd in 2000. Vitali had fits trying to land his shots against Byrd and ended up having to take off a lot of the power on his shots in order to land anything at all.

Arreola may find that he can have some success if he can avoid Klitschko’s big shots and work him over to the body at close range and then come upstairs with uppercuts to Vitali’s exposed jaw. Vitali is there for the taking tonight if Arreola can stay in close and take advantage of Klitschko’s straight up fighting style.