diff --git a/sleekxmpp/xmlstream/matcher/xpath.py b/sleekxmpp/xmlstream/matcher/xpath.py
index 3f03e68e..f3d28429 100644
--- a/sleekxmpp/xmlstream/matcher/xpath.py
+++ b/sleekxmpp/xmlstream/matcher/xpath.py
@@ -9,16 +9,10 @@
     :license: MIT, see LICENSE for more details
 """
 
-from sleekxmpp.xmlstream.stanzabase import ET
+from sleekxmpp.xmlstream.stanzabase import ET, fix_ns
 from sleekxmpp.xmlstream.matcher.base import MatcherBase
 
 
-# Flag indicating if the builtin XPath matcher should be used, which
-# uses namespaces, or a custom matcher that ignores namespaces.
-# Changing this will affect ALL XPath matchers.
-IGNORE_NS = False
-
-
 class MatchXPath(MatcherBase):
 
     """
@@ -38,6 +32,9 @@ class MatchXPath(MatcherBase):
     expressions will be matched without using namespaces.
     """
 
+    def __init__(self, criteria):
+        self._criteria = fix_ns(criteria)
+
     def match(self, xml):
         """
         Compare a stanza's XML contents to an XPath expression.
@@ -59,28 +56,4 @@ class MatchXPath(MatcherBase):
         x = ET.Element('x')
         x.append(xml)
 
-        if not IGNORE_NS:
-            # Use builtin, namespace respecting, XPath matcher.
-            if x.find(self._criteria) is not None:
-                return True
-            return False
-        else:
-            # Remove namespaces from the XPath expression.
-            criteria = []
-            for ns_block in self._criteria.split('{'):
-                criteria.extend(ns_block.split('}')[-1].split('/'))
-
-            # Walk the XPath expression.
-            xml = x
-            for tag in criteria:
-                if not tag:
-                    # Skip empty tag name artifacts from the cleanup phase.
-                    continue
-
-                children = [c.tag.split('}')[-1] for c in xml]
-                try:
-                    index = children.index(tag)
-                except ValueError:
-                    return False
-                xml = list(xml)[index]
-            return True
+        return x.find(self._criteria) is not None
diff --git a/sleekxmpp/xmlstream/stanzabase.py b/sleekxmpp/xmlstream/stanzabase.py
index 122d7eb4..120373db 100644
--- a/sleekxmpp/xmlstream/stanzabase.py
+++ b/sleekxmpp/xmlstream/stanzabase.py
@@ -192,7 +192,7 @@ def fix_ns(xpath, split=False, propagate_ns=True, default_ns=''):
         for element in elements:
             if element:
                 # Skip empty entry artifacts from splitting.
-                if propagate_ns:
+                if propagate_ns and element[0] != '*':
                     tag = '{%s}%s' % (namespace, element)
                 else:
                     tag = element