Spectators streaming towards gate eight at the Waca less than an hour before the start of the Test series between Australia and South Africa yesterday were greeted by a sight not often seen at a cricket match. There on a pavement too nearby to ignore, its red and blue lights flashing, hulked a fire engine.Extractor fans in the kitchen of one of the restaurants at the ground had not been turned off, which triggered the summoning of emergency services."They were here in 30 seconds," a security guard said with a hint of professional envy.In due course the truck went back from whence it came, job done. They should have stayed. There was a fire that needed putting out.The first sparks flew with the fourth ball of the morning, which squared up Stephen Cook, took the edge of his bat, crested high over gully and was caught by Mitchell Marsh.An hour later the innings was a teetering inferno: 32/4 and burning down faster than a petrol-bombed braai in a gale.Hashim Amla was gone for only his ninth duck in 160 Test innings.Dean Elgar, caught behind, and JP Duminy were also out, the latter on the snickometer's say so.Then Faf du Plessis and Temba Bavuma starved the blaze of oxygen for more than an hour, but the former's effort was snuffed out by a fine shoulder-high catch by Adam Voges at first slip.Bavuma added a half-century of true grit, an innings carved out under exponential pressure.Quinton de Kock brought a different approach and with it runs. But when he was 16 short of a century a slower ball from Josh Hazlewood blooped off the top edge of his bat and plopped into midwicket's hands. Bugger.But De Kock had helped add 146 runs to a total that was ablaze on 81/5 when he arrived.Did that put the fire out? Yes. But another was soon raging after they were dismissed for 242.It's name was David Warner and there was no controlling its roar through everything South Africa's bowlers threw at it.Warner slashed seven boundaries off the first 28 balls he faced before his opening partner, Shaun Marsh, stroked his first four.He would have been out leg-before for 17, but Vernon Philander had overstepped. Bugger again.Instead, Warner was 73 not out at stumps yesterday as the Aussies replied with 105/0...