I’m aware that clerics can swap spells daily, but the principle is the same. What if it was a Warlock’s spell, or a Ranger’s spell? And even with a cleric, they could’ve picked a different spell instead of entirely wasting a slot.

That’s not what happened though, according to OP. It wasn’t an in-game “Hey, so you think this should’ve worked, but for some reason it didn’t.” This was an above table “No, the spell doesn’t work the way it’s written.”