diff --git a/pyproject.toml b/pyproject.toml
index 6f9986a0..d7dac1d4 100644
--- a/pyproject.toml
+++ b/pyproject.toml
@@ -61,9 +61,11 @@ description = "Pytest plugin for Celery"
 homepage = "https://github.com/celery/pytest-celery"
 license = "BSD"
 name = "pytest-celery"
-version = "1.0.0a7"
+version = "1.0.0a8"
 
 [tool.poetry_bumpversion.file."src/pytest_celery/__init__.py"]
+search = '__version__ = "{current_version}"'
+replace = '__version__ = "{new_version}"'
 
 [tool.poetry.dependencies]
 python = ">= 3.8,<4.0"
@@ -163,5 +165,10 @@ source = ["src"]
 omit = ["tests"]
 
 [tool.coverage.report]
-exclude_lines = ["pragma: no cover", "if TYPE_CHECKING:", "except ImportError:"]
+exclude_lines = [
+    "pragma: no cover",
+    "if TYPE_CHECKING:",
+    "except ImportError:",
+    '__version__ = ".*"',
+]
 omit = ["*/python?.?/*", "*/site-packages/*", "*/pypy/*"]
diff --git a/src/pytest_celery/__init__.py b/src/pytest_celery/__init__.py
index 0e9a8dd1..ee0881a9 100644
--- a/src/pytest_celery/__init__.py
+++ b/src/pytest_celery/__init__.py
@@ -5,7 +5,7 @@
 # flake8: noqa
 
 
-__version__ = "1.0.0a7"  # pragma: no cover
+__version__ = "1.0.0a8"
 
 
 import re
@@ -49,10 +49,11 @@
 
 # bumpversion can only search for {current_version}
 # so we have to parse the version here.
-match = re.match(r"(\d+)\.(\d+)\.(\d+)([a-zA-Z]+[0-9]*)?", __version__)
+match = re.match(r"(\d+)\.(\d+)\.(\d+)(.+)?", __version__)
 if match:
     _temp = match.groups()
 else:
+    # Comments are not allowed in the same line as the version string.
     raise ValueError(f"The version string '{__version__}' does not match the expected pattern.")
 VERSION = version_info = version_info_t(int(_temp[0]), int(_temp[1]), int(_temp[2]), _temp[3] or "", "")
 del _temp