diff --git a/fs/ocfs2/xattr.c b/fs/ocfs2/xattr.c
index 2c069029cef7..3a16b4a36d9a 100644
--- a/fs/ocfs2/xattr.c
+++ b/fs/ocfs2/xattr.c
@@ -6061,11 +6061,20 @@ static int ocfs2_check_xattr_bucket_collision(struct ocfs2_xattr_bucket *bucket,
 					      u32 name_hash)
 {
 	struct ocfs2_xattr_header *xh = bucket_xh(bucket);
+	u16 count = le16_to_cpu(xh->xh_count);
+
+	/*
+	 * An empty bucket keeps the hash of the entry that was removed in
+	 * xh_entries[0] so that it can still be found, but it holds no
+	 * entries to collide with.
+	 */
+	if (!count)
+		return 0;
 
 	if (name_hash != le32_to_cpu(xh->xh_entries[0].xe_name_hash))
 		return 0;
 
-	if (xh->xh_entries[le16_to_cpu(xh->xh_count) - 1].xe_name_hash ==
+	if (xh->xh_entries[count - 1].xe_name_hash ==
 	    xh->xh_entries[0].xe_name_hash) {
 		mlog(ML_ERROR, "Too much hash collision in xattr bucket %llu, "
 		     "hash = %u\n",