Pereyra has not shown he is anything more than a utility player so far. Candreva is a very good winger. Willian is a very good winger. Lucas is a very good winger. Pereyra is not at their level.
I would blame allegri for not being able to stop the decline in performances especially against the big team. Usually against european teams we create a lot, waste a lot and are shaky in defense. While in Italy we were confident in winning against any italian team with very rare exceptions. Now against big Serie A teams we create very little, waste the little we create and are very shaky in defense as if we are playing in Europe. This is on a team level. We are worse than before.
On a player level, Llorente is playing like Amauri despite hitting great form last season. Vidal is slowly getting back to his old level while marchisio has improved. Our summer signings have been useless so far with Pereyra, Evra and Morata (in that order from bad to worst) not adding anything to the squad. The latter almost got red carded for diving twice.
I am sorry but Allegri so far is not doing any better than Conte's worst season with a better squad. He is arguably doing worse or at the very least not halting the decline.
I am not sure I agree with you.
I think Pereyra is ok as a b2b midfielder. But I really liked him as a right AMC in the 4-3-2-1 we were playing. I was impressed. He drifted wide and offered width. Quick feet. Flair. Speed. Nice crosses. Some intelligent passes. And combined really well with Tevez. Also, he didn't have to try to finish. I liked him a lot there. We dismantled Parma and made the Sampdoria match look easy. The problem is when you put him to play as the only AMC. That's a completely different story. Only a handful of players can play this role. It requires extreme vision and the ability to continuously change your moves, so you are not marked out. Kaka could do this. Sneijder could do it. Ozil can maybe do this. But there are not a lot of players that can do it. Be careful, I am not talking about a 4-2-3-1, or any system that the opponent will have to mark 2 or even 3 attacking midfielders and the attacks will do through 2 or 3 players. I am talking about a system that there will be only 1 AMC, who will be the focal point and will initiate the attacking efforts.
I would blame Allegri for changing the 4-3-2-1 that seemed to work so good in favor of the 4-3-1-2, especially at the time that we don't have a genuine AMC star player and we have to put Vidal/Pereyra in there. In 4-3-2-1 Pereyra, Tevez and also Llorente were better. I liked way more Tevez in there (he had space to move and create) and also Llorente was better (who has played his best football in Bilbao with such a system with Munian in the Tevez role and Susaeta in the Pereyra one).
Llorente is not good this year. But we are not helping him a lot as well. He often is alone in the area. With Conte, Tevez was playing next to Llorente, which helped the latter one. When Allegri let Tevez play in a more free role, he made Tevez better, but at the same time isolated Llorente a lot. Also, Vidal can't properly play the AMC role. He often goes back to help marking, because partly of Pirlo. So, Llorente is up there by himself. Of course Llorente's hesitation to shoot doesn't help, but the whole team does not help him as well.
Regarding the summer transfers, I can't tell that they are awesome or that we found our star player. But I am satisfied and far away from calling them useless. I explained about Pereyra. I like Evra. We seem to finally find a natural decent LB who can cross and has also developed a very good understanding with Pogba. Regarding Morata, he still tries to find his role. But he is far from disappointing. I would also say that his best form came in those 2 matches that we used the 4-3-2-1. He scored 3 goals in something like 30 minutes or so.
I can't blame Allegri for much of it. He looks at our bench and sees no game changer. He has to do the same substitutions game after game. Regarding the system, of course he knows a lot more than me and tries to shift towards this 4-3-1-2. As hard as I try though, I really can't see why. I will start blaming him if we change to 4-3-1-2 and use Sneijder in the hole. I would do that change only for an exceptionally good player. Only for the player Sneijder was 3 years ago for example. Right now, I see 4-3-2-1 as our best bet. Pereyra, Tevez and Llorente work optimally in this. The same can be said for Morata according to the stats. And I think it's the system Coman would excel as well. Screw Sneijder, sign Shaq, use Pereyra as his backup, have Coman as Tevez's backup (no big pressure on him but opportunities to rest Tevez), get Vidal to play as an MC again and we are set for the next 1-2 years.