MANILA - A celebrity hairstylist has apologized to fans of Nadine Lustre after he blurred the actress' photo out of his post congratulating the winners of a recent online poll of a local men's magazine.

Lustre finished third in FHM Philippines' "sexiest" poll behind Jennylyn Mercado and winner Jessy Mendiola. The magazine shared a photo of the three announcing the final rankings.

John Valle, who has worked with Mercado and Mendiola, reposted the photo on his own Instagram page. However, fans of the "On the Wings of Love" star found it insulting that he blurred out Lustre's image.

"You could have cropped Nadine instead of blurring her, hindi ba?" one of Lustre's fans asked Valle via a Twitter post.

In his apology, Valle said that he only wanted to highlight his work on the photos of Mercado and Mendiola. "I didn't mean to offend anyone," he insisted. "I just wanna show the hairstyle that I did to Jennylyn and Jessy. Hope you understand. Thank you."

He also deleted his post and made his account private.

How can you crop or blur this girls beautiful face?

TELL. ME. HOW.

Respect Nadine Lustre pic.twitter.com/rRzQmbVBXj

— julia ♡ (@ratchetnaddie) July 1, 2016

Valle's photo, however, made its way to Twitter and garnered the ire of Lustre's fans, sending the phrase "Respect Nadine Lustre" to the top of the local trending topics of the social networking service at one point.

In the weeks before voting for the online poll closed, Lustre sat on top of the list. She was later overtaken by Mendiola and Mercado, the winner last year.

Many criticized Lustre's inclusion inside the top three, with some claiming that the actress only ranked high on the list because of her devoted fan base born out of her onscreen tandem with boyfriend, James Reid.

Lustre herself admitted being flattered with the initial results, and maintained that she will not pose in skimpy outfits should she win the poll. It has been a tradition to have the winner walk a catwalk at a victory party.