diff --git a/rewrite-xml/src/main/java/org/openrewrite/xml/XPathMatcher.java b/rewrite-xml/src/main/java/org/openrewrite/xml/XPathMatcher.java
index 3eb48a7248c..6d9a2b0c8bc 100644
--- a/rewrite-xml/src/main/java/org/openrewrite/xml/XPathMatcher.java
+++ b/rewrite-xml/src/main/java/org/openrewrite/xml/XPathMatcher.java
@@ -38,7 +38,7 @@
 public class XPathMatcher {
 
     // Regular expression to support conditional tags like `plugin[artifactId='maven-compiler-plugin']` or foo[@bar='baz']
-    private static final Pattern PATTERN = Pattern.compile("(@)?([-\\w]+|\\*)\\[((local-name|namespace-uri)\\(\\)|(@)?([-\\w]+|\\*))='(.*)']");
+    private static final Pattern PATTERN = Pattern.compile("(@)?([-:\\w]+|\\*)\\[((local-name|namespace-uri)\\(\\)|(@)?([-\\w]+|\\*))='(.*)']");
 
     private final String expression;
     private final boolean startsWithSlash;
@@ -197,7 +197,8 @@ public boolean matches(Cursor cursor) {
             for (int i = 0; i < parts.length; i++) {
                 String part = parts[i];
 
-                Xml.Tag tag = i < path.size() ? path.get(i) : null;
+                int isAttr = part.startsWith("@") ? 1 : 0;
+                Xml.Tag tag = i - isAttr < path.size() ? path.get(i - isAttr) : null;
                 String partName;
                 boolean matchedCondition = false;
 
diff --git a/rewrite-xml/src/test/java/org/openrewrite/xml/XPathMatcherTest.java b/rewrite-xml/src/test/java/org/openrewrite/xml/XPathMatcherTest.java
index e58a9b5cf49..a8b7e81a37e 100755
--- a/rewrite-xml/src/test/java/org/openrewrite/xml/XPathMatcherTest.java
+++ b/rewrite-xml/src/test/java/org/openrewrite/xml/XPathMatcherTest.java
@@ -105,6 +105,9 @@ class XPathMatcherTest {
                                   http://www.example.com/namespace3 http://www.example.com/namespace3.xsd">
           <element1 ns3:attribute1="content3">content1</element1>
           <ns2:element2>content2</ns2:element2>
+          <parent>
+              <element3 ns3:attr='test'>content3</element3>
+          </parent>
         </root>
         """
     ).toList().get(0);
@@ -159,6 +162,7 @@ void matchPom() {
           pomXml1)).isTrue();
         assertThat(match("/project/build//plugins/plugin/configuration/source",
           pomXml2)).isTrue();
+//        assertThat(match("/project/build//plugin/configuration/source", pomXml2)).isTrue(); // TODO: seems parser only handles // up to 1 level
 //        assertThat(match("/project//configuration/source", pomXml2)).isTrue(); // TODO: was already failing previously
     }
 
@@ -314,6 +318,11 @@ void matchAttributeElement() {
         assertThat(match("//ns2:element2/@*", namespacedXml)).isFalse();
         assertThat(match("/root/ns2:element2/@*", namespacedXml)).isFalse();
 
+        assertThat(match("/root/parent/element3/@attr", namespacedXml)).isFalse();
+        assertThat(match("/root/parent/element3/@ns3:attr", namespacedXml)).isTrue();
+        assertThat(match("/root/parent/element3/@ns3:attr[namespace-uri()='http://www.example.com/namespace3']", namespacedXml)).isTrue();
+        assertThat(match("//element3/@ns3:attr[namespace-uri()='http://www.example.com/namespace3']", namespacedXml)).isTrue();
+
         // TODO: fix mid-path // match with attribute element
 //        assertThat(match("/root//element1/@*", namespacedXml)).isTrue();
 //        assertThat(match("/root//element1/@*[namespace-uri()='http://www.example.com/namespace3']", namespacedXml)).isTrue();