Norwich City has often had a strong Welsh presence in their side and even today youngsters such as Chris Llewellyn continue this trend. In the late 1980s and early 1990s, three Norwich players were regulars in the Welsh squad. They were Mark Bowen, Jeremy Goss and Dave Phillips. Phillips joined Norwich from Coventry in the summer of 1989 and marked his Canary debut with a goal after two minutes against Sheffield Wednesday. Forming a strong link down the Canary left with Mark Bowen, Dave made 186 appearances for the Canaries scoring 20 goals. He played an important role in the Canary team that finished third in the inaugural Premiership (1992/93) .

Prior to joining Norwich, David played for Plymouth (73 appearances, 15 goals), Manchester City (81 league games, 13 goals) and Coventry (100 league games, 8 goals) with whom he won the FA Cup in 1987.

In August 1993, he joined Nottingham Forest as he could not agree terms for a new contract with Norwich leaving the club prior to their European campaign in 1993/94. He helped Forest gain promotion to the Premiership but has since been overlooked at times by the various Forest managers. In November 1997, he joined Division One strugglers Huddersfield Town. He accepted another one year contract at the end of 1997/98 but joined Lincoln City on a free transfer on transfer deadline day (March 25th 1999)

After 17 appearances for the Red Imps, Lincoln announced in March 1999 that they would not be extending Dave's contract for the 2000/2001 season even though Phillips believed he could still compete in league football. In October 2000, Dave joined Conference side Stevenage but within weeks, he had applied for the manager's position at Conference rivals Nuneaton. Dave left Stevenage in the summer of 2001. According to Welsh football site Dragonsoccer, Dave has returned to Coventry to coach their Under-14 youth side. He also works for BBC Wales as a summariser for games involving Cardiff, Swansea and Wrexham.

As of 2012, Dave has left Coventry and works for Sky.