Cell variant in table column

Dear experts,

I have a simple table element with a column that contains a cell variant for a dropdown list. This is a dynamic table and the cell variant is set for the 3rd column based on the field value in the 1st column. Only the first row will contain the cell variant in the 3rd column. For all other rows, an input field in the cell is used for free text entry. See table below.

I have set the cell variant accordingly for the dropdown list in the first row and this works fine. For the other rows, I have cleared the variant value (for selectedcellvariant) and expect that free text input will work as it takes on the columns celleditor properties. However, after inputting some values in the 3rd column and attempting to save, I get this error for the value input in row 2, column 3 - "The entered value is not in the list of valid values". No variant is bound to this cell so please shed some light on this. Thanks.

value 1 some other value Dropdown list for characteristic value (bound to cell variant) value 2 some other value Free text (variant value is cleared) value 3 some other value Free text (variant value is cleared)