diff --git a/package/MDAnalysis/coordinates/base.py b/package/MDAnalysis/coordinates/base.py
index ea5203d9954..54f11f95615 100644
--- a/package/MDAnalysis/coordinates/base.py
+++ b/package/MDAnalysis/coordinates/base.py
@@ -1667,8 +1667,6 @@ def __init__(self, filename, convert_units=True, n_atoms=None, **kwargs):
            self.filename = filename
         else:
            self.filename = str(filename)
-           if "MMTF" in self.filename:
-              self.filename = filename
 
         self.convert_units = convert_units