diff --git a/src/ccmain/adaptions.cpp b/src/ccmain/adaptions.cpp
index bff8651ab1..21660f73ac 100644
--- a/src/ccmain/adaptions.cpp
+++ b/src/ccmain/adaptions.cpp
@@ -37,7 +37,6 @@ bool Tesseract::word_adaptable(  //should we adapt?
         uint16_t mode) {
   if (tessedit_adaption_debug) {
     tprintf("Running word_adaptable() for %s rating %.4f certainty %.4f\n",
-          word->best_choice == nullptr ? "" :
           word->best_choice->unichar_string().string(),
           word->best_choice->rating(), word->best_choice->certainty());
   }