Li - who holds postgraduate degrees in law and economics from Peking University - was promoted to the leadership at the 18th party Congress in November 2012, and to head of government in March 2013. Since then, most analysts have given him a high approval rating.

"I think he's doing a good job," said Hong Hao, managing director and head of research at Bocom International, an investment bank and securities broker.

Referring to the leadership's effort to shift the country's development model from relying on exports and capital investment to domestic consumption, he said: "Economic restructuring is continuing, and now consumption is rapidly becoming the largest contributor to growth."

Li has had a tough task of managing a slowing growth rate, preventing a crash, and keeping people in jobs. He has also taken effective measures to balance stimulus to fuel growth without piling on excessive debt.

Hong said Li had made great progress in cooling the property market and streamlining government power in business.

Li has made it his priority to cut the government's power to intervene in the markets and to cut the number of investments needing state approval.

Under his stewardship, the State Council, the chief administrative authority, has reviewed one-third of its business administration approval items - scrapping some and relaxing various controls. Li's government has scrapped rules demanding minimum capital of 30,000 yuan (HK$38,000) for start-up limited liability companies.

In the past two years, start-up registrations have soared; last year, up to 10,000 new businesses were registered each day - a 50 per cent increase compared with 2013.

"Coupled with the reform in business registration that makes it easier for smaller businesses to start, it revitalises an economy that used to be dominated and stagnated by SOEs [state-owned enterprises]," Hong said.

Li had also succeeded in cooling the mainland's property market without too much harm to the overall economy, Hong added.

"What Li did for the property sector was to encourage sales to help remove existing inventory, but without any stimulus for further property investment," Hong said. "As such, it has meant less capital will be sunk into this already bloated sector."

Property is more affordable: a typical home costs 8.8 times the average household's annual income, down from 12 times in 2010, says the Economist Intelligence Unit, a division of The Economist Group, sister company of .

Yet some analysts said that, so far, Li had lacked the charisma or style to attract international attention, as Wen and Zhu had done.

Xi's two predecessors, Jiang Zemin and Hu Jintao, played negligible roles in the economy and shared power evenly with Zhu and Wen; Zhu was in full charge of China's entry into the World Trade Organisation and Wen took control of the massive 4 trillion yuan stimulus plan to respond to the 2008-09 global financial crisis.

However, Xi has weakened Li's role by assuming the primary role of overseeing economic reforms. Some analysts have said Xi has subverted a nearly two-decades-old division of power, whereby the president handles politics, diplomacy and security, while the premier manages the economy. The most symbolic moment was at the Central Committee's Third Plenum in 2013, when the final document had Xi's imprint all over it, even though it focused on macroeconomic issues that Li should have taken the lead on.

Li rose from humble beginnings to succeed Wen as economic kingpin. Unlike his two predecessors, who built power bases through their positions in regional and central governments before they were made premiers, Li rose through the Communist Youth League. He found success in bolstering the economy of relatively backward Henan province and revitalising Liaoning , an industrial province that suffered in the aftermath of the country's economic reforms.

Zhu had been the mayor and party boss of Shanghai, the mainland's commercial and financial hub, while Wen was the chief of staff at the party Central Committee's General Office and worked as a top associate to three party chiefs before becoming premier.

Li boasts a doctorate in economics and is viewed as a capable steward of the economy - a big strength given this is the premier's key responsibility.

Since coming to office, Xi has absorbed more portfolios as he established and personally headed many important organisations such as the leading group for overall economic reform, the National Security Commission, the central leading group for internet security and information, and the leading group for military reform.

Laurence Brahm, a Beijing-based economist, said Li's administration was following directions from Xi, who was paying close attention to the functions of each government ministry.

"Xi is steering the overall economic direction of China at this crossroads of reform, its foreign relations and the new global financial architecture that is arising from both," Brahm said. "He is involved in the details of Li's daily administration."

Brahm said there was now a much tighter focus of influence from the top compared with the Hu-Wen administration, which saw a more collective, less centralised decision-making process, with Hu concerned more about broad ideological matters and Wen focusing on management of the government.

Steve Tsang, chairman of the School of Contemporary Chinese Studies at the University of Nottingham, said that during the Hu-Wen partnership, Hu had allowed or even wanted Wen to play the lead in public relations.

However, the Xi-Li partnership saw Xi hogging the limelight. Tsang said Li was required to show that while he, on behalf of the government, cared about the people, he must not outshine Xi.

"Contrast the handling of the aftermaths of the Sichuan earthquake and the Yangtze River ship capsizing disaster: the different requirements imposed on the two premiers seems clear," Tsang said.

Kerry Brown, director of the University of Sydney's China Studies Centre, said Li had been able to claim a bit more of the limelight in the past year.

"Xi has been pumping out policy initiatives and promises, but these mean nothing if the government can't deliver," Brown said. "And so he needs Li to perform."

Some observers said that since Li was second-in-command in almost all of the central leading groups headed by Xi, his power seemed to have expanded rather than shrunk.

"Li is the leader in this current group who has the most intellectually coherent outlook on policy," Brown said. "He is probably less of an instinctive politician than Xi. In some ways, that is a good workable combination."

Economists said Li had been more effective than Wen in managing the economy. Some described Wen's 10 years in office as China's lost decade. Li took over an economy that had grown tremendously. But the problems that his predecessor inherited have become worse.

Jianguang Shen, of Mizuho Securities Asia, said Li had stepped up economic initiatives, including financial reforms, the elimination of administrative red-tape, financial deleveraging, and urbanisation.

Li initiated the Shanghai Free Trade Zone as a testing ground for free-market policies, he said.

Some analysts said the Shanghai FTZ was a major part of the leadership's reform drive, and could be the third major milestone in the liberalisation of the Chinese economy, following the special economic zones in the 1980s, and the country's WTO entry in 2001.

Li has chaired a series of cabinet meetings to make decisions such as breaking up the state sector's monopoly in banking and finance, energy, telecommunications, transforming the taxation system to ensure a balance between the central and local administrations, and establishing transparency in government.

Analysts believe his grit and determination is reminiscent of Zhu, who is credited with leading the previous round of national economic reforms in the late 1990s when he sacked more than 50 million workers at state-owned businesses to trim the bloated sector.

The analysts said the present aggressive Zhu-style of governance meant China might be sacrificing short-term growth for more balanced expansion.

Shen said Li's economic philosophy was built on three pillars: liberalisation of key prices, including interest and exchange rates; elimination of entry barriers and red tape; and deepening of reforms.

Despite Xi's efforts to establish himself as the most powerful Chinese leader since Deng Xiaoping, analysts said that, as time went on, Li would not be eclipsed by Xi's shadow.