its unexpected, such a degrade in performance is not natural. Its good to inform VMware by an SR.
>>Is there any possibility to downgrade (recreate) VMFS to 5.54 instead 5.58?
its not possible to downgrade the VMFS version. As far as I know we cant creat a 5.54 version of VMFS from 5.1 host.
If performance is the main concern you can give a try by creating a VMFS3 volume. Its possible form 5.1 host.