"Hopefully we can get to the final again and this time Paul will get his opportunity," Ferguson told the Sunday Mirror.
"I'm not a sentimentalist by any means. My one aim has always been to manage the club in the right way.
"But if we got to the Champions League final again then I'm telling you that I would have to be sentimental when it came to choosing my team for that one. I'd have to pick Paul to play because he deserves it.
"Paul doesn't say much about missing out in 1999, but it must have hurt him. He will still feel it because players like that always do.
"Players with his calibre and with his record of being a winner will have felt bad about missing out. It would have hurt Paul just as much as it hurt Roy Keane.
"To miss the biggest club game in the world must have an impact.
"Paul won't talk about things like that because he is not the kind of man to let disappointment destroy him. You only have to see what he has won in the game to realise that."