Particles generated behind sprite - phaser-framework

Question

I just started out with Phaser.
I have a simple sprite in the middle of the screen, and whenever I click the sprite, I emit a particle at the clicked x,y coordinates.
My problem is that the particles are generated behind the sprite. I have tried setting z on the sprite to 1 and the emitter to 1000 without luck.
What am I missing?
var emitter = game.add.emitter(game.world.centerX, game.world.centeryY);
emitter.makeParticles('phaser');
var sprite = game.add.sprite(game.world.centerX, game.world.centerY, 'phaser');
sprite.scale.setTo(2, 2);
sprite.inputEnabled = true;
sprite.events.onInputDown.add(function(sender, pointer){
emitter.emitX = pointer.x;
emitter.emitY = pointer.y;
emitter.emitParticle();
}, this);
http://phaser.io/sandbox/cxBVeHrx
EDIT
My actual code is based on the Phaser-ES6-Boilerplate. Even though BdRs answer solves the issue in the sandbox code, I'm not able to utilize this in my real code.
I have uploaded both the code and a running example. Hopefully someone can tell me where I have screwed things up...

Answer 1

Separate Phaser items don't have a z-order, instead it just depends on the order you create and add them to game. Each new sprite or emitter or group etc. will be displayed on top of all previously added items.
So, simply changing your code to something like this should work.
// first the sprite
var sprite = game.add.sprite(game.world.centerX, game.world.centerY, 'phaser');
sprite.scale.setTo(2, 2);
// then the particles in front of sprite
var emitter = game.add.emitter(game.world.centerX, game.world.centeryY);
emitter.makeParticles('phaser');
// then maybe text in front of particles and sprite
var mytest = game.add.bitmapText(10, 20, 'myfont', 'Level 1', 16);
// etc.
Btw sprites do have a .z value but that only used when it's part of a Phaser.Group, it will then be used as the display z-order but only within that group of sprites.

Answer 2

By default, phaser will not sort objects that get added to any group, it will just render them in the order that they get added. In your case, you can just add the emitter to the group after you add the sprite (the group in this case is the 'game' object).
Of course, having to add objects in the drawing order is not ideal, and if you need to have them sorted dynamically, not possible.
Another way is you can sort objects within a group using the 'sort' function, in which you give it the name of a parameter to sort by, and you sort whenever you need to (in some cases, in the Update callback).
Sorting every frame can be a performance hit though, especially if you have a lot of objects. Another way you could go about this is by adding groups, sorting those groups in draw order (think of them like layers), and then adding objects to those groups in any order. Any group that needs sorting within itself you can sort as well. This way, you can choose to have (for example) a background layer not needing to be sorted but everything added to that layer will be behind every other layer.

Answer 3

Good answers from everybody, but you are missing that every GameObject has a depth property which serves exactly the z-index purpose. This way you do not need to rely on the order of objects creation.
There is also an official
example.
Hope this helps.