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A Labour MP has been forced to apologise over a controversial "Whack-a-Sturgeon" tweet that he later deleted after First Minister Nicola Sturgeon was hit by a tennis ball in Glasgow.

The SNP leader was visiting Dennistoun in Paul Sweeney's Glasgow North East constituency on Saturday when she and former SNP MSP Anne McLaughlin tried their hand at a game of swingball during a local festival.

Sturgeon later uploaded a clip to Twitter of McLaughlin's serve which took her by surprise and crashed into the side of her head.

Sweeney then shared the video online , captioning it: “‘Whack-a-Sturgeon’. A sport I could definitely get behind.”

He hastily removed the post but not before social media users spotted his remarks.

Among them was the First Minister herself who uploaded a screenshot of the comments, sarcastically saying: "What a charmer..."

As he was taken to task by a host of Twitter users who said his "disgusting" post helped normalise violence against women, Sweeney offered an apology to the First Minister.

He wrote: "It was merely my weak attempt at being lighthearted by making a pun on 'whac-a-mole', but I quickly realised it could be misconstrued, so please accept my apologies for any offence.

"You're welcome to have a free hit at me on the swing ball on your next visit to Dennistoun!"

(Image: Twitter)

Scores of Twitter users had earlier branded Sweeney "brainless" as they slammed the tweet for lacking "decency and respect".

Paul Burns commented: “What an A**hole he is! I've never understood this type of cruel behaviour.”

While @ElSpark wrote: “That’s an elected Labour MP? My god. What’s happened to decency and respect?”

Gordon Paton said: “What a disgusting tweet for him to post given current vitriol.”

Janice Mills posted: "Endorsing violence against all women or just successful ones? Surely not a subject to joke about? The man lacks intelligence and insight.”

And Lisa Disch said: “Politicians who have no argument to bring forward always aim low.

"They are brainless, helpless, hopeless examples of bad taste and even worse behaviour.”

In the clip of the swingball game, Sturgeon can be seen casually awaiting McLaughlin's serve while enjoying an afternoon at the H Lane festival in Dennistoun.

But she got more than she bargained for as her opponent unleashed a forehand Roger Federer would be proud of.

(Image: Daily Record)

The crowd let out a collective gasp as Sturgeon was hit by the ball.

Uploading the video of her Twitter, Sturgeon said: "Great time in Dennistoun today - until the moment Anne McLaughlin whacked me on the head with a tennis ball!"

But there was no apology from her SNP ally who obviously has no regrets about being the more powerful player.

She posted online: "I play to win these days. And I did."

The SNP pair made the most of their day out, meeting locals in the east end while posing for snaps on a Triumph motorbike and chatting with a young medieval trumpeter.