diff --git a/debian/watch b/debian/watch
index 65b8013d8..33875c8de 100644
--- a/debian/watch
+++ b/debian/watch
@@ -1,5 +1,5 @@
 version=4
 opts=filenamemangle=s%(?:.*?)?v?(\d[\d.]*@ARCHIVE_EXT@)%@PACKAGE@-$1%,\
-     repack,dversionmangle=auto,repacksuffix=+ds \
+     repack,dversionmangle=auto,uversionmangle=s%-?([abrc])%~$1%,repacksuffix=+ds \
      https://github.com/libgit2/libgit2/tags (?:.*?/)?v?@ANY_VERSION@@ARCHIVE_EXT@